


Avatar Chronicles::To Truly See

by Sapphire_Raindrop



Category: Avatar (2009)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Jake/Neytiri - Freeform, Lots of OCs - Freeform, OC/OC - Freeform, Tipani Clan, a healthy mix of fluff and real-life shit, lots of world building/expansion for those of you interested, so get ready, so many of them
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2020-11-07 20:17:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 60,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20823206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphire_Raindrop/pseuds/Sapphire_Raindrop
Summary: Sara Mason is a twenty-five year old xenobotanist who's lived on Pandora for seven years when she meets Jake Sully and realizes that things aren't as simple as they seemed where the Na'vi are concerned. After accepting the gift of becoming One with The People following the Great Battle, she begins her journey of discovering her place in a world that used to terrify her. [Note: This is a darker, more mature re-write of the original story, which can be found at FF.net under the same name/author-aka yours truly]





	1. In The Beginning

_  
Electronic Journal_

* * *

_Name_: Sara Mason

_Location_: Hell's Gate

_Time/Date_: Afternoon/Middle of the week(?)

_[Additional comments]_: I have no idea what the exact time or day is, and I'm too frazzled by all that's happened to bother checking. I'll be sure to input a time and date for future entries, though, for continuity's sake.

* * *

_Entry 1_

_I never expected to go to Pandora. _No one_ expected to go to Pandora; it was the kind of thing that people dreamed about, more a fairy-tale that parents told their children before bedtime than an actual possibility. _

_How could those stories be seen as more than fairy-tales, after all, when they involved distant bioluminescent forests filled with tall, blue-skinned beings and animals with far more legs than they should have? _

_With that in mind, you can imagine my surprise when I, Sara Mason, an eighteen-year-old college kid majoring in xenobotany, was given an offer I couldn't refuse: free passage on one of the Pandora-bound shuttles as part of the Dedicated Study Program—in simpler terms, a way for the RDA to train up-and-coming xenobiologists to Pandoran standards rather than Earth ones. Before I stepped onto that shuttle and set off toward a new and unfamiliar planet, those bedtime stories clouded over the harsh facts I knew about Pandora, filling my head with images of a beautifully peaceful planet just_ _ waiting_ _ to be explored. _

_Oh, how quickly my vision was shattered._

_Mere seconds after being led out of the shuttle with my oxygen mask securely in place I saw a man being carried on a stretcher, a large feathered arrow protruding from his chest. I can remember with horrible clarity the coldness that swept over me when he died—it happened maybe a minute later, signaled by a too-quiet stillness filling the air where his yells of agony should have been._

_That man's death was only the beginning of the horrors I would witness on Pandora._

_Starting that first day I was put to work. Not exciting work, mind you, just the grunt work that all new workers in a research lab are put to; miles and miles of paperwork, cleaning and organizing equipment and the occasional request to label and bottle samples. Over time I began to hear whispers of the 'Avatar Program' based in the eastern sector of Hell's Gate. _

_For those raising their eyebrows at the name, let me clarify: Hell's Gate is the residents' nickname for the RDA Pandoran Research Base but at this point, Hell's Gate is used so widely that no one bothers using the original title. _

_Anyway, back to the Avatar Program. I'll be honest; I was way too focused on my own studies and theories about the planet's ecosystems to get hyped up about some weird program that I knew very little about but that even with limited knowledge sounded like more trouble than it was worth. _

_It's funny, looking back on it, because I probably wouldn't have gotten so heavily involved in this whole mess if I hadn't worked so diligently that first year. To give you an idea: I was studying samples when everyone else was sleeping in their beds and I was researching while everyone had their coffee breaks._ _ For all that I was afraid of Pandora and the very real dangers it presented I was also more than a little obsessed with the place. _

_A year later I was one of the most advanced scientists in my division and it was then that I met Dr. Grace Augustine for the first time. It was a day I remember down to the last little detail: I hadn't showered in two days, my jeans and plain green work-shirt were covered in dirt and preserved animal fluids and I was sitting in a lab that I was 200% _ _not_ _ allowed to be in. _

_I didn't wake up that day planning to break the rules, I swear. I started the day in the regular lab as usual, where I spent most of the morning analyzing a tree root sample that the other trainees had pushed aside. There was nothing unique about it, they said, just a slightly stronger electrical current than the Pandoran norm. I had a gut feeling that it wasn't so simple, though, and so like any passionate, sleep-deprived student would do…I broke into one of the more advanced laboratories to examine it more closely. _

_What I found was _amazing_. The root actually had __synapses__, like those in the human brain, only more complex and more powerfully transmitted. _

_I was so intent on my task that I didn't notice the door opening and a woman walking over to stand behind me. I remember what she said so clearly that when I close my eyes and picture it, her raspy words echo just as strongly in my mind as they did in the room that day: _

_"Amazing, isn't it?"_

_I jumped so violently that I had almost knocked over the microscope. She laughed in a way that should have reassured me, but I was too busy staring at my knees and waiting for her to start yelling at me for breaking and entering. My fear was double what it would usually be because I _ _knew_ _ who this scientist was. _

_She was Dr. Grace Augustine, a _legend_, the very first Pandoran specialist—and still the best, even years later. Not to mention that she was one of the strictest, no-bullshit scientists in this base. She knew the rules as well as I did; this laboratory was strictly forbidden to first years. Punishment for using other people's equipment could result in being sent back to Earth, losing your job—_

_With that in mind, you can imagine how shocked I was when she nudged me aside to look at my sample with an experienced eye, muttering:_

_"You've got initiative, risking your ass to take a second look at something the others didn't think was important. What's your name again?"_

_"Sara Mason, ma'am."_

_"I've heard about you, Sara. Surprising for a first year,_ _ especially_ _ surprising for a scrawny nineteen-year-old. Most of the idiots your age are too busy adjusting to the gravity and then_ _using_ _ that newfound gravity to kiss the asses of the higher-ups to stand out much."_

"_Um…thank you?" I squeaked out, not sure whether to be flattered or insulted—a bit of both, I think. _

_"I'd say that it was time you got with some people who actually give a damn about learning about Pandora. Come to the Avatar Station tomorrow and we'll get you set up."_

_She stood up and walked out, almost casually, as if she hadn't just shifted my entire world on its axis. I must have sat there for a full ten minutes afterwards before remembering where I was and scrambling to clean up and escape. _

_Now that I look back on it, I wish I had turned the opportunity down. Maybe if I had I could have avoided the pain and confusion I now carry with me everywhere. _

_The next morning they took a sample of my DNA, and it was only_ _ after_ _ they had done that that they informed me of my involvement in the Avatar Program. In six years I would have my own Avatar to drive._

_Saying I was shocked by the offer would be the biggest understatement in the history of the world._

_But I couldn't refuse at that point because the whole Avatar business takes up a lot of money from the government, and to back out would be like shoving my middle finger in Dr. Augustine's face, which was a _big _no-no for anyone with even just a _scrap_ of self-perseveration. So I just nodded in agreement and my work went on as usual, only now I was working with some of the top scientists in the Pandoran field. _

_It was in the next six years that I came to know exactly what the alien culture of the Na'vi was and what we were trying to accomplish by creating Avatars and trying to negotiate with the clans._

_It was terrifying._

_The first time I saw video footage of Na'vi warriors attacking RDA foot-soldiers I had trouble sleeping for a week afterwards. Every time I closed my eyes I heard the wet sound of a Na'vi arrow slicing clean through a human soldier's skull._

_Dr. Augustine assured us that as long as we remained peaceful and non-violent with the Na'vi, nothing like that would occur, that the only reason the Na'vi had attacked was because the RDA soldiers in question were stupid enough spook and start shooting when one of the alien warriors reached down to pick up the animal he had finished hunting. Even her reassurances couldn't assuage the tight grip of fear in my chest. What if it was too late for negotiating? What if the idiots with guns already ruined our chances at a peaceful solution?_

_On a slightly less somber note, watching my Avatar body mature in a tank was _weird_. It was like watching a baby mature in the womb of its mother but part of it was _me_, me in a way that unnerved me. _

_At the end of the growth period my Avatar stood at nine feet seven inches—quite a bit taller than the female Na'vi average of nine feet three inches. There was a sharp, feline beauty in its features; I had to keep reminding myself that they were _my_ features too. Grace was pleased with the result, saying how they had taken a huge risk with my Avatar by tipping the scales of the genetic ratios by adding more Na'vi genes than normal. The risk paid off, though, because my Avatar looked much more like one of the natives than the usual, more human-featured Avatars. _

_Okay, not to cut myself off, but I feel as if I'm wasting time telling you all of the petty details of the beginning of my life here. _ _None of that is important, not really. _

_I'm going to skip forward to the day that Jake Sully got lost in the jungle. I want it on record that I was worried about him from the beginning, especially because of his background as a brave—in Pandoran scientist terms: dangerously reckless—marine. Maybe he had gotten away with that kind of stuff back on Earth but here on Pandora being reckless is what got you __killed__.__ As cocky and irritating as he was (I don't _care_ that he's one of my best friends, I stand by that statement even if there's a very big chance that he'll read this someday, because he _was_ an ass at first and he _knows_ it) I certainly didn't want him to _die.

_I'm sure you can imagine the surprise that circulated throughout the station when Jake woke up from link-sleep after hours and hours of him being missing. It was of course a huge relief, as we were afraid that he was being killed or toyed with by the thanator that Dr. Augustine had last seen him running from during the gathering of plant samples. The surprise turned to disbelief when he not only woke up but went on to tell us that he had been taken in by the Omaticaya Clan and was being taught their ways by none other than Neytiri herself. It was a fluke; a once in a lifetime chance that was so unlikely that it hadn't crossed any of our minds. _

_After all, the Omaticaya were extremely aggressive towards anything RDA related—the hostilities had started two years ago, when they shut down Dr. Augustine's English school. I had never gone, as my Na'vi body hadn't been ready at the time, but it had been clear from the moment I saw pictures of her with the children that it was the woman's pride and joy, her reason for being on Pandora above all else. _

_The reason behind the closure had broken something in all of us, even those of us who had never met the children. _

_There had been an attack on a RDA bulldozer by some of the older students, and in retaliation the RDA followed them back to the school and killed them. It was only by sheer luck that Dr. Augustine and the other teachers managed to get the others out in time. _

_The Omaticaya had hated the RDA—and by association, the Avatar Program—ever since. _

_Dr. Augustine never mentioned the closing of the school beyond informing her personal staff of its closure, and her silence spoke more than any anger or tears could have—she loved the Omaticaya children like she would have loved her own, and being cut off from any contact with them or the Clan broke her heart._

_Life went on after Jake's return, only with a twist. _

_Colonel Quaritch was now more involved than ever in the Avatar program. I didn't like the way his eyes seemed to gleam with pride whenever he looked at Jake Sully, or when he put his scarred hand on Jake's shoulder as if to say, 'He's yours on paper but don't fool yourself—he answers to _me_.'_

_Now, seeing as Jake and I had become unlikely friends in the snippets of time he spent unlinked, the territorial glint to the colonel's eyes scared the shit out of me. I should mention before I forget that Jake's and my mutual friend Norm Spellman, a young anthropologist who spent much more time with the rest of Augustine's team than Jake did, agreed with me the moment I brought Quartich's odd focus on Jake and the Avatar Program when before he couldn't have cared less about our research. _

_Norm took a bit more time to warm up to me, the little asshole (Norm, I know you're going to read this and say 'how _dare_ she' but just hush because you were a bit of a snob and everyone we know can and _will_ confirm it if asked, so don't try me), but soon we three were as thick as thieves. As thick as thieves who weren't in the same room very often could be, anyway. _

_I mentioned the bad feeling I had about the man to Dr. Augustine and was relieved when she seemed to take it to heart; after a month of doing her own observations of Quartich she ordered the Avatar division to pack up some supplies for a long term stakeout. She, Norm and Jake would travel into the deep parts of the Hallelujah Mountains. On paper it was to get geographically closer to the Omaticaya but a select few in the Avatar Program knew that it was to escape any and all contact with Colonel Quaritch and the other RDA officials who were more focused on how to exploit the Na'vi rather than coexist peacefully._

_I remember feeling a bit hurt that Dr. Augustine didn't invite me to join them, but now I know that it was my own damn fault for not logging in more Avatar link hours. Petty excuses set aside, the real reason I used to avoid being in my Avatar body because I was scared of how __not-__me it looked. The mirror would show an alien face with large, lemur-like eyes and luminescent dots on the bridge of the nose and on the forehead and cheeks, smooth blue skin patterned with faint, darker blue stripes.__ Part of me were there but the majority was a stranger, a _powerful_ stranger that could do the same things to fragile human scientists as the Na'vi warriors had done to so many RDA soldiers over the years. _

_Instead of logging link-hours I focused on finding out more the Tree of Souls. It was one of their strongest connections to Eywa—aka the Na'vi deity that was believed to control all life on Pandora._

_There were only so many hours I could spend looking at the microscope, though, and so another pastime arose. I began collecting the video-logs that Jake Sully sent in and watching them whenever I could. _

_I was fascinated by the changes that occurred in him as the weeks went by. One day he'd be confident as hell and the next he was more subdued, glancing around as if expecting to see something else. _

_"Everything is backwards now, like out there is the true world and in here is the dream."_

_I remember his face when he said those words, how the soft blue light that lit up the shack sent shadows across his hollow face as he stared into the camera as if searching for answers in the lens. I remember my blood running cold as I slowly set my coffee mug down on the metal counter. _

_As the Na'vi would say; I _saw_ him in that moment, more than I had seen him in all the video logs since his departure. _

_That was the moment that I knew—perhaps I had known it for longer than that but only then was willing to admit it—that Jake had fallen in love with Pandora, just as Dr. Augustine had._

_I remember switching off the monitor with a forceful click, as if to take my mind off of the frustration and hopelessness I felt. I turned away from the computer and stared out at the lush forests of Pandora, watching the rain make rivers on the thick glass that separated me from the jungle beyond the walls of Hell's Gate. _

_I had seen death in those trees, I had seen bloodshed and I had seen violence._

_For the first time, as I stared out into the rain that day, I saw only the beauty._

_I don't remember quite how I got there but suddenly I was in one of the self-linking rooms, one that was hardly used anymore because of its difficulty to reach. I was small and so I was able to squeeze into the small room without much trouble. I jumped into the link bed feeling disconnected from myself, as if I was watching myself from above rather than experiencing things first-hand._

_It was the first time I had gone into my Avatar alone. It was the first time that I didn't feel any hesitation as I pulled the wire, light covered mesh over my chest, and closed the heavy door over my head, sending me into calm darkness._

_When I opened my eyes again I was in the large wooden shack that was reserved for Avatars in rest. _

_My long, blue-skinned legs swung over the side of the cot more gracefully than my human ones ever could have. I felt the strength in my feet as I stood and tucked the tight braids that went to my shoulders behind my ears before unlocking the main door. _

_Now, I could try to explain the feeling I experienced as I ran through the hard-packed dirt of the compound, but I'd end up being at a loss for words. I'll describe what my senses told me, instead. _

_The rain fell with delicate dropping sounds on the broad leaves of the interior gardens, my ears swiveling around to hear every call of the birds talking to each other beyond the wire fence that blocked us off from the forest. The flowers drooped over with the weight of the water and my feet dug into the soft, rich-smelling dirt with a determination that had no definable source. _

_I don't know how far I ran but when I stopped, I remember leaning my face back and stretching my arms out on either side as if to embrace the water as it fell down in cold sheets._

_What would have I done if I hadn't met Jake Sully? If I hadn't walked into the lunch room soon after Jake's return from his introduction to the Omaticaya and joined him and Norm for a late-night coffee? _

_Jake's words, his journey in becoming Na'vi, they had both taught me how _beautiful _Pandora was._

_(Seven and a half years is a long time for an epiphany like that, sure, but better late than never, right?)_

_The moment—and my temporary ignorance—was shattered by a yell from one of the soldiers. I turned around to see a gun being pulled on me. The gun was held by a burly soldier who I had often seen talking with Colonel Quaritch, and that connection sent a jolt of worry through me. He yelled at me to get on my knees and I did so without hesitation before asking what was wrong._

_"Colonel's orders; all Avatars have to be quarantined while we start the attack on the huge tree. Why aren't you in the regular linking room?"_

_My shock was so great that I demanded to know why they were initiating the attack; it was the first time I had ever talked back to a soldier. _

_"They're savages—it's only a matter of time before they try to kill us all!" _

_It was the end of the conversation, clearly, because he jerked his gun in clear demand for me to get up and marched me back into the shack. I jumped at the sound of a deafening boom in the far distance, my Avatar body's senses able to pick up the faintest scent of smoke and fear. _

_As I lay down and closed my eyes something wet slid down my cheek but before I could register what it was the feeling of being disconnected abruptly tugged at my consciousness. I opened my eyes to the saddened face of one of my first and closest friends here in the Station, Dr. Max Patel. W_ _e had been in the same arrival group but didn't become close until a few years into the Avatar Program. _

_I remember clearing my throat and reaching up to touch my face, only to find that it was wet with tears._

_"Are they really...?"_

_"Yeah. We tried to stop them, but…"_

_I wanted to sit up, to get out and do _something_, but at the same I knew that if I got up out of the link-unit I would see the destruction with my own eyes, see the fire and fear raging in the forest that had once been so full of life. _

_I remember putting my face between my knees and retreating into myself. Max, gentle and sweet Max, put his arm around my shoulders and sat with me as I cried. _

_It was a horrible day._

_I was led down by Max an hour later only to witness Dr. Augustine and Jake being hauled out of their units. Jake was dazed and limp, his expression filled with an emotion I still don't have words for. Norm was being subdued by two soldiers, his eyes wet with tears of horror and fury._ _Dr. Augustine was kicking and sobbing. _

"_You _murderers_!"__ she screamed. _

_None of the soldiers paid any attention to my mentor's piercing accusation and proceeded to carry her, Norm and Jake from the room. I met Max's eye, then, and I will swear up and down until the day I die that in that moment, both of us were thinking the exact same thing: if we could get Jake, Grace, and Norm back into their Avatar bodies, then maybe we could find a way to bring down the RDA, a way to stop all of this from going any farther than it already had._

_We had to try, at least. _

_Now, since I'm cramped for time in this station as it is, I'm going to have to glaze over the description of exactly _how _Max and I got the three out of the holding cells, but let's just leave it at the fact that we never could have done it without the help of the pilot Trudy Chacon. I won't deny that a lot of it was pure luck but I like to think that _some _was a result of our brilliant planning._

_Anyway, we finally got to the hanger, me pushing Jake's wheelchair so that he could save his energy for getting into the copter. Before heading into the hanger, Jake grasped Max's arm and my hand. _

"_Thanks, guys. It'll be good having two people on the inside that I can trust. Be in touch; let us know what's going on."_

_I'm crying as I write this, but I'm going to power through because I want to remember how full of life Dr. Grace Augustine looked as she walked through the hanger doors. I can't let the memory of the fierce determination that glinted in her eyes as she turned to glance back at us fade away. _

_I remember smiling and I like to think that she smiled back, but in the moment I couldn't be sure. _

_Then, the hanger doors closed and we were alone in the hallway._

_That was the last time I ever saw Dr. Grace Augustine._

_She died, later, from a gun wound made by Colonel Quaritch's shooting at Trudy's copter as they escaped. I never got to tell her how much I had grown to love her, as a mentor, as a mother-figure._ _ Anyone who has lost someone unexpectedly can understand the agony of not getting to say goodbye—and to those who haven't, count yourselves lucky, because it's the worst kind of pain you can imagine. _

_When the hanger doors closed, Max and I made our way back to the medical quarters only to find it in an uproar, people crying and shouting._

_Somewhere in the midst of the chaos and uproar I very calmly decided that today was the day I finally grew a pair and joined a goddamn rebellion. It's funny how simple it sounds but it truly was that quick and pure of a thought; one second I was torn and the next I was on a _ _mission_ _. _

_I remember turning without a word and heading to the small link room. Max, of course, followed right behind me._

"_Sara, what the hell do you think you're doing?"_

"_I'm going to help them__."_

"_Running off into that jungle _isn't _going to help!"_

_I remember giving Max a look—the look he hated because I did it when I was putting my foot down. "So protecting Jake's human body while he is in Avatar form wont help?"_

_Max tried to make excuses. "But that's miles away! You'll never make it in time!"_

_I guess it's a testament to Max's faith in me—or my ability to make incredibly stupid ideas seem much more reasonable than they actually are—that it only took a minute or two of explaining my plan to him before he agreed to help. _

_Months and months ago Jake had given me a definitely illegal-level tracking device—capable of sending signals even in the worst connected places and created specifically for Dr. Augustine's inner circle—before leaving for the Hallelujah Mountains, just in case they needed someone to find them quick. I agreed that I would always keep it on me and out of the higher-ups' hands and his agreement in turn was that he would tape his to the link-bed he used in the trailer that had become their home base._

_I wasn't a fighter, not by a long shot, but the idea of Jake's human body left undefended in a flimsy trailer was enough to make me want to _ _try_ _. _

_Once Max sent me into the link, I once again opened my eyes to the ceiling of the Avatar shack. This time I didn't marvel in the sensations of my much taller, stronger form, as I had just hours before. I scrambled out of bed and ran to wrench open the door that led to the medical area of the shack—filled with survival essentials as well as medical gear. Trying to pack for every possibility while shaking and trying to calm panicky breathing isn't easy, in case you were wondering. That nervousness only increased when I leaned over to grab a huge gun that before that day I never would have dreamed of touching. I also strapped a wicked looking dagger to my waist because I had seen enough footage of interactions with the wildlife to know that guns sometimes weren't enough. _

_Max arrived shortly after with a shallow but long empty metal box that had a few medical labels slapped onto the side. I remember my tail twitching in anticipation; the memory stood out because it's difficult to forget thinking to oneself, albeit hysterically: 'This must be what it feels like to have a penis.' _

_As the sounds of soldiers neared I climbed into the box, tucking the rebellious tail in question tightly behind me and taking a deep breath of preparation even though Max had punched holes on the underside so that I could breathe when the lid was closed. _

_The rest I wish I could tell you—I might go into further detail in another entry on how truly terrifying it was for me to be locked in a fragile metal box for hours on end—but as I said before, my petty details aren't important in the long run. I need to get to the point in my journey where everything went wrong, the part where my plan_ _ changed_ _._

_My box was placed in the cargo hold of the foot soldier ship, as planned, but what I didn't expect is that they would need to dump the cargo in order to make their ship more fuel efficient in battle. And so when my box was suddenly lifted and thrown into empty space for several horrible moments before hitting the water so hard my head smacked against the side, I panicked and instinctively started kicking at the lid. _

_I only realize now how dangerous it was for me to panic like that. If I had kicked the box at a different angle I could have pushed the locking mechanism into position so I wouldn't be able to get out at all, leaving me to drown._

_Luckily, none of those occurred._

_Water was pushing through the air holes in heavy waves when I finally kicked the door open. The submergence into the cold water threw me off guard for a second before I instinctively pushed off the metal surface and into the open expanse of the river. Once I got to shore I spent a few precious minutes gasping for air and trying not to think of how close of a call that had been. _

_The forest loomed overhead, lush and tranquil, cruel in its concealment of the fact that a goddamn _war _was going on. _

_My gun had been lost in the commotion of being dumped in the river but my waterproof travel bag was still on my back and the tracker safely tucked inside one of the interior pockets. _

_It's impossible to figure out what I should have felt, running through the forest and knowing that whether I lived or died would be determined by my skill with the puny knife in my hand. One side of me, the human side, was screaming nonstop but the Na'vi part was almost _ _excited__, like it was all a game instead of life or death. It wasn't long before I heard the screams of the Na'vi fighting; one second there were only trees and the next I was on the edges of the battle, everything as vivid as if spotlights had been placed upon them._

_Na'vi men yelled as they shot their poison dipped bows, the cries cut off as the bullets from RDA guns hit them and their six legged steeds. I remember running to hide behind a tree, trying to block out the sounds of the dying because I had to focus on getting to the trailer. If Colonel Quaritch found it he'd kill Jake without batting an eyelash._

_At that moment a very familiar Avatar ran by with a gun in his hands, his braid swinging behind him and his yells adding to the chaos. __It was _Norm_. _

_I'm still mad at him for putting his life on the line, even as I tell the story of me doing the _exact_ same thing, but to be honest I'm much angrier at myself for calling out his name. _

_Him turning his head in my direction meant that he didn't see the human soldier aiming at him, therefore unable to take cover before a bullet caught him in the thigh. I ran over to him as he fell, as close to the ground as I could go, and pulled him into the safety of the brush._

_"What the hell are you doing here?" he demanded, yelling to be heard over sounds of gunfire and Na'vi screams. _

"_I came to protect Jake's human body. If they find it, he's screwed." I explained in a rush, peeling Norm's fingers from his wound and examining it. The bullet was still in there; I would needed pliers to get it out._

_Norm was fading; he had always been squeamish around blood. I slapped his face with so much force that his head snapped to the side but it worked—he shook himself into alertness. _

_He was scared and I was scared but we managed to get to the site after about twenty minutes of carefully skirting the battleground. _

_The trailer was in a secluded clearing surrounded by trees and partially covered by foliage. Norm suddenly went limp and there was this moment when I thought he was dead and couldn't stop yelling and shaking him. _

_(I was so scared, Norm. You laughed about it when I told you, and I joined in so that things wouldn't be awkward, but you need to know how goddamn _scary_ it was to feel you go lifeless like that. I was terrified I had lost you and I never,_ ever_ want to feel like that again.)_

_Then I heard his human cries of pain in the trailer, had a 'oh yeah, pain can break the mind-link' moment and quickly dragged his Avatar over to one of the larger trees that bordered the trailer and shoved him under the roots for safekeeping._

_It's almost funny; during the entire battle I was calm as you please but inside I was filled with such constant, suffocating terror that I'm surprised I managed to speak in full sentences after it was all over._

_Norm came out a few minutes later with a gun in his hands and an oxygen mask strapped to his face. He looked up at me—it was so strange being taller than him, even stranger to feel a wave of protectiveness at the fragility of his human limbs in comparison to my own strong Na'vi ones. _

"_I'm going back out."_

_He didn't give me a chance to respond before he charged towards the distant sounds of fighting. _

_The battle had changed all of us. The Jake I met that first day, the hardened marine that thought only of himself and his orders first, now going directly against those orders and risking his life to save thousands of people that he didn't even know. Norm, the passionate scholar, now fearlessly engaging in a battle he wasn't anywhere _ _near_ _ equipped to fight in. Me, quiet little Sara with a sharp mind but a weak spine, now rebelling against the RDA in defense of an alien people that still featured in some of my nightmares. _

_There was no going back, not for any of us. _

_The only warning I got before getting shot in the shoulder was the brief glint of a glass window and the harsh smell of machine oil on the breeze. The impact was every bit as awful as you can imagine, so quick that I staggered a few steps before the pain set in with a vengeance. Gasping in gulps of air that now seemed much too shallow, I looked up to see the smirking face of Colonel Quaritch through the window of an AMP suit. _

_A loud, inhuman snarl escaped my teeth—my last act of defiance. _

_When Neytiri appeared a split second later on the back of a thanator—a sight so amazingly badass that it was almost worth getting shot just so I could be there to see it—I took the opportunity to escape because I would only get in the way if I stayed. _

_Pain skewed the passage of time; I ran for what felt like both an eternity and a split second. _

_Finally, my knees buckled under me, causing me to fall roughly on my wounded shoulder. Screaming was all I could do for a while after that. Once I had exhausted myself enough to think again I rolled over to my back, watching the light slowly fade from the sky until the clouds were a gold and crimson blur._

_In those hours of waiting to be found and devoured by a predator, I wondered what it would feel like to die while linked to my Avatar. Would I wake up in my human body? Or would they open up the unit to see that my human body was dead as well? What would happen?_ _ I still don't know, come to think of it. I'll have to ask Max when I'm done writing this entry. _

_Anyway, back to how I ended up back at Hell's Gate and able to write these words for whoever is reading this. _

_When something wet touched my arm without warning I instinctively pushed it away, frustration seeping through the haze of pain. Was it too much to ask for a quick, less irritating method of killing me? The wetness touched my arm again and I like to think that the only reason I was able to sit up was through the sheer strength of my annoyance. _

_I'm unashamed to admit that I screamed bloody murder when I opened my eyes to see what was touching me. It was one of those horse things—what had Jake called them? Oh yeah, direhorses. The direhorse's long tongue came out to lick my arm instead of skirting away like it should have. I pushed the animal's snout away again before registering that someone was _ _riding_ _ it._

_It was a Na'vi warrior, that much was clear, but his angular features were unfamiliar to me. There wasn't a smile on his face but he wasn't frowning, either. He was just _staring_ at me._

_(I still think about that guy, wonder what would have happened to me if he hadn't shown up when he did. Hopefully I'll see him again so I can thank him. He spoke with a different accent than the Omaticaya, though, so it's possible that he's part of another Clan and has already returned to his home, wherever that may be.)_

_The warrior spoke, then, and thank god for Dr. Augustine and her stubbornness because I was able to understand every word he said. _

_Dr. Augustine once said that I'd walk away from our one-on-one language lessons understanding Na'vi or I wouldn't walk away at all. It took three years, but her perseverance had ensured that I could understand everything that was said, even while my speaking skills remained _ _atrocious__. _

_I nodded furiously at his asking if my name was Sara Mason, friend of Toruk Makto, closing my eyes as the pain returned with a vengeance. I heard him dismount and felt his large fingers examining my wound._ _ For all that his voice was unyielding, his touch was gentle._

_The warrior muttered to himself that the wound was deep. It sure felt like it and so I didn't bother with a response. The last thing I felt were strong arms scooping me up and then I fainted like the damsel in distress that I am, apparently. _

_I woke up in the link bed—still alive, hell yeah!—to the relieved faces of Max Patel and Norm Spellman._

_In the end, the Na'vi successfully eliminated the RDA and now, all the humans are being shipped back to Earth. Well, almost all the humans. Max, Norm, myself, and the twenty scientists that have Avatars are being allowed to stay. I saw Jake in his wheelchair this morning and felt a stab of pity, but only for a moment._

_Jake is permanently transferring into his Avatar._ _Tonight, in fact. _

_That's not even the craziest part, though. The truly baffling fact is that they're offering the same gift to Norm and I. Not tonight, as Jake had quickly clarified when he saw my expression, but if we accepted it would happen within the next few days. _

_Norm said yes in a heartbeat. But me? I'm still deciding. _

_So yeah…that's my story so far. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to end my journal there for today because I need to try and get some sleep before attending Jake's ceremony at the Tree of Souls. I doubt that I'll sleep much but I'm going to try my best. _

_I keep looking over at Jake's empty wheelchair. Looking at it brings me back to that day in the lab, oddly enough, the day Dr. Augustine offered me a job and swept me into this insane life of mine. It makes me think of late nights spent sitting with Jake in the mess hall, quietly talking about the nightmares that kept us from sleeping properly and the people we had lost that often starred in those dreams.   
_

_It's funny how random things like wheelchairs remind you of that kind of stuff, isn't it?_

_Okay, no more tangents. My bed—my wonderful, gloriously comfy, _warm_ bed—is calling. _

_I'll just have to wait and see what tomorrow brings. I won't lie; I'm terrified. But hey, who ever said life here on Pandora was easy?_

_End of Entry 1_


	2. Here We Go

_Electronic Journal_

* * *

_Name: _Sara Mason

_Location: _Hell's Gate

_Time/Date: _0500 hours/November 20, 2154.

_[Additional comments]_: That puts the date of my first entry at November 18, 2154. It's been a week since the Battle for Pandora, and while I know in my mind that its over and done with I still feel on edge, as if I'm in the thick of it rather than writing about the aftermath. Is the weird in-between feeling normal?

* * *

_Entry 2 _

_I'm pretty sure that it's written somewhere in the United States Constitution that no one should _ever_ have to wake up this early after the week I've had. _

_But I digress…_

_All of the humans are gone except for the ones chosen to remain here, and Jake is no longer considered one of those. I met with the new Jake a few days ago after the mind-transfer went off without a hitch—let's just leave it at I was pretty miffed with how much taller he was. I had to get him to kneel down so I could talk to him without having to crane my head back to an impossible degree. _

_On a happier note we've managed to eradicate the toxic parts of the RDA program and are working towards sending a message to any who would try to follow in their footsteps. _

Don't try to colonize Pandora or you'll meet the same fate as the RDA.

_I couldn't help feeling a little bit proud when I typed that into the letter being sent to Earth. Jake read it over my shoulder, grinning in that feral way that was both familiar and slightly disconcerting. Especially with those sharp fangs he now had. Yikes. I suppose I'll get used to it, especially if I finally make a decision about whether I want to become fully Na'vi. _

_Aside from Jake's new awakening, life here at the base feels almost normal again. But no matter how excited we all are about finally defeating the RDA, one cruel hard fact still continues to rear its ugly head. _

_Hometree is gone, _hundreds_ of Na'vi are dead and the air is still haunted by the ghosts of the soldiers and Colonel Quaritch—and with them a taste of the cruelty they unleashed here. The hearts of the Na'vi will heal but I doubt they will ever forget. I sort of hate humans at this point, too, even though I'm still one of them myself. Our race has the potential to be so greedy, wasteful, and destructive that it makes my stomach turn. Visiting the ashes of the Omaticaya Hometree only solidified that feeling. _

_So much sorrow still lingers. _

_But the clans are healing, slowly rebuilding and honoring the warriors they lost. Jake and Neytiri brought us the good news yesterday—the Omaticaya had located a new Hometree and were in the process of clearing it out and making it livable for the survivors of the Battle. Neytiri hadn't smiled when relaying the news, still in mourning, but she had observed Jake's excitement and joy with clear love in her eyes. _

_I was shocked that she even came to the base at all. Even after her father being killed, she's_ still_ open to the idea of humans being allies, though I'm sure it still took a lot of persuading on Jake's part to convince her to step foot in Hell's Gate. _

_Anyway, back to why I'm up at 5am to begin with. _

_Max woke me up thirty minutes ago—he's always up at ungodly hours so I wasn't too surprised to see him awake—and asked if I'd like to go with Norm to make sure our Avatars were fully functional. I said yes, he left to go wake up Norm, and here we are—awake, barely, and squinting against the harsh glare of the computer screen. _

_I still don't know what I'm going to do about the 'becoming one with The People' offer. Being human is the only thing I know how to be. Even though I have an Avatar body that I've trained in it's not anywhere close to what I'd be opening myself up to. To truly be Na'vi you also have to accept their way of living, their language, their culture, _everything_. It isn't just about getting a new body; it's trading in my human identity, Sara Mason, for some stranger with blue skin and yellow eyes. I would still be Sara, inside, but my body would be something else. _

_But is human really what I want to be? Just look at what happened to Hometree, to all those innocent people who died trying to escape from their home's collapse. Look what happened to Dr. Augustine. _

That's _where it gets tricky. _

_Dr. Augustine loved the Na'vi more than she loved herself. They were more her kin then her family back on Earth. She died under the branches of the Tree of Souls, the one place that she had yearned to go to for so long, and when I saw her corpse I saw that her mouth was forever frozen in a smile. _

_In the end, she became one of The People, just not in the way any of us would have liked. She was at peace; that was the one thing that I was absolutely sure about. _

_But the question is: where do _I_ belong? _

_One day, my place was with the RDA and I was _content_ with that. The next, I was a rebel acutely unsure of her place, faced with the cruel reality of human greed and the chaos it brings. My place is no longer with the RDA, but if it isn't with them then where _is _it? _

_Everything is backwards now._

_End of Entry 2_

* * *

I sighed before closing the small computer screen over the keyboard until it locked with a soft _click_. Writing in this journal helped me organize my thoughts, sure, but I hadn't been able to record half of the emotions I was feeling. Hell, half the emotions I was feeling right now couldn't be put into words: how's _that_ for a dilemma?

After leaning down to tuck the laptop under my pillow, I flopped backwards onto my bed to stare aimlessly at the ceiling, trying to find patterns in the pale grey plaster. I felt so _old _sometimes; whenever I wrote in that journal the feeling was intensified. It was so easy to forget that I was only twenty-five years old.

When I finally did get out of bed my feet tingled at the icy touch of the tile floor. I frantically examined my reflection in the mirror when I got to the bathroom and snorted almost in the same moment.

What, was I suddenly worried about sprouting gray hairs? Not that I would be _too_ surprised, considering the amount of stress I'd been under lately.

I splashed some water on my face and took a good look at myself, studying my face for the first time in months.

My blonde hair had been brutally short my first year but the years that had passed since then had grown all the way to my lower back—its length was only due to the fact that I could never quite find the time or motivation to cut it—and was currently tied in a loose braid to keep it out of the way while I worked. My face had long since lost any hint of childish roundness and the bridge of my nose and cheeks were covered with freckles. When I smiled experimentally my lips parted to reveal slightly crooked teeth that were still fairly white in spite of my coffee addiction. I had gained a bit of weight since my first year but that was all muscle; the RDA required the Avatar drivers to participate in a strict training regimen in both human and Avatar form so that the muscle memory could be more easily transferred.

Someone knocked lightly on the door and I opened it to reveal an impatient Norm. He knew better than to try to engage me in conversation this early in the morning, instead handing me a small to-go cup of coffee and moving to my side as we started down the hall. The emptiness was eerie after seven years of constant activity and human presence, and I hoped that Norm didn't register that I had sidled closer to him as a result.

When we reached the link-room we found Max contentedly sipping a cup of tea as he stared out at the dawn-lit Avatar training yard. Max was a peaceful guy; he had hated the fighting as much as I had—even _more_ so, I'd say.

His dark eyes lifted at the sound of our entry.

"You guys ready?" he asked.

"Yep!" Norm declared before hurrying to a link bed. Max knew me better, though, and a hand on my wrist stopped me from following Norm's example. I sent my friend what I hoped was a confident smile, one that he probably saw right through but was kind enough to pretend that he didn't.

"I'm okay," I said under my breath, sliding my trapped appendage through his grip in order to give his hand a squeeze.

After a moment of intense scrutiny Max moved away and let me choose a link unit of my own.

A few minutes later I opened my eyes to the Avatar shack. Norm was already walking up and down the aisle between beds, rolling his shoulders and neck to get rid of any kinks.

I stifled a yawn as I sat up; being linked with a new body didn't make me feel any less tired than before.

When we were both on our feet, Norm and I both slapped two high fives in quick succession—a pre-training ritual among the Avatar drivers. I didn't bother putting on any shoes, instead heading outside with Norm right behind me.

The eastern quarter of the training ground had been transformed into the Omaticaya clan's new English school. All unnatural construction, including the fence protecting that side, had been ripped away, leaving only the jungle and a large chalkboard situated under an expansive wooden overhang—a shelter from the inevitable rain. If I squinted I could see a small group of Na'vi children (obviously shadowed by wary parents and a few adult Na'vi who wished to learn) sitting around an Avatar who was holding up a tablet of simple vocabulary—an sweet-natured linguist named Jennifer. 

I glanced over at Norm.

"So, they're settling into their new Hometree?"

Norm nodded. "It's not too far from the old one, which makes them feel more secure, but it's different enough to distract them from...well, from _everything_."

I was about to reply when a sharp banshee cry echoed out. Knowing what we would find before even looking up, Norm and I exchanged a wry look before turning to track the newcomer's arrival.

The familiar blue-teal banshee dove toward us, its rider grinning widely enough to be seen even from a distance. I rolled my eyes; only one person I knew had that overconfident grin, and that person was Jake Sully.

Jake cackled with glee as he spiraled to the ground and his banshee shrieked right along with him. Norm took a few steps back as the two got closer but I didn't move, folding my arms over my chest in challenge.

Norm's face blanched in horror. "That idiot isn't going to have enough time to stop!" he yelled.

I was close enough to see Jake's grin turn into a smug smirk when I didn't move. God, he was so cocky it was almost a health hazard. My eyes narrowed as the banshee showed no sign of stopping.

_If you so let that banshee so much as _breathe_ on me, you're _dead_._

As if reading my thoughts, Jake quickly pulled upward, causing the banshee to cry out once more and frantically attempt to stop its downward momentum. The air was thick with the animal's distinct odor and the wind created by its wing beats was so strong that it flattened the long grass around my feet. I cringed at the heat of the banshee's underbelly on my face before Jake managed to back up and land properly.

He grinned. "Sorry about that," he said cheerily as he and Norm bumped fists in greeting, sounding the least sorry I had ever heard. "Rogue and I are still working out the kinks when it comes to diving." The banshee in question kept his distance, as was the usual with banshees when they were around non-riders.

Jake caught my eye and let out a laugh at my disbelieving scowl, slinging an arm around my waist and tugging me into a tight hug. I melted into the embrace, wondering how it was that even after mating with Neytiri, Jake's scent was the same as it had always been. Na'vi mated pairs released different pheromones after the mating ceremony that made their scent less appealing to those outside the pair. It didn't prevent contact, or physical coupling outside the "marriage", but it definitely put a damper on the possibility. Maybe it was the fact that he was a human-Na'vi hybrid? I'd have to run the idea past Max later, maybe run some tests.

After releasing Jake, I glanced at the trees behind him.

"Is everything okay with the Clan?" I asked.

Jake nodded, smiling wryly at Norm's inability to stay still—the guy was practically quivering with eagerness.

"So…are we…you know…"

He flushed—quite an odd sight, really, seeing as it turned his face a strange shade of blue-ish purple—and Jake leaned back to scratch at Rogue's neck. The beast crooned under his rider's attentions, and when Jake gave him a final pat he took off into the sky once more. Jake waited until the banshee disappeared into the nearby trees before replying:

"Tonight. That is, if you agree. It's okay if either of you don't want to. It's a huge decision to make."

He was looking at me in particular as he said that, ignoring Norm's excited babbling.

I swallowed hard. "I just need some more time to think."

Before Norm could speak, telling me how crazy I was to have to _think_ about it, I quickly strode toward the gate that led into the forest, grabbing a gun as I went. I heard Norm calling after me but ignored him, making sure my gun was loaded before strapping it across my back. The forest was still dangerous and I wasn't about to go in there unprepared.

I opened the gate just enough to let my body pass through before closing the fence behind me with a loud metallic clatter. It was early morning, so I was fairly safe—the predators around the base tended to be nocturnal.

The forest was lovely, alive with vivid colors and the twittering of insects and other creatures that inhabited the trees. I sighed, staring up at the canopy and admiring how the soft light of dawn poked through the large green leaves. I darted across a river, balancing on a log that made up a thick bridge and jogging to avoid getting splashed by the cold water.

After crossing I slowed my pace, brushing my hands along the smooth, moss-covered bark of the trees as I passed them.

Suddenly, something small and glowing caught my eye, hovering in the hollow of a tree up ahead.

Frowning, I moved closer to examine the source of the glowing. It was very much like a jellyfish, gently waving strands of soft pink twirling in the air as it floated in my direction. I watched it float in the sunlight for a few moments before holding out my hand, for once acting on an impulse without thinking about the consequences. A feeling deep in my gut told me that in this moment, I didn't _need_ to be afraid.

The creature landed gently on my outstretched fingers and twirled around before floating off again, circling me. It reminded me of a ballet dancer—effortlessly graceful.

I found myself circling with it, my feet unconsciously carrying me in a slow dance of sorts. The small pink creature seemed to thrum with energy as I did so and began mimicking my movements. Its glowing tendrils brushed against my skin and each time they did a shiver of something unfamiliar and yet _comforting_ swept up and down my spine.

I suddenly remembered Jake mentioning an occurrence like this in one of his earliest video logs and slowed to a stop.

What _was _this thing?

The glowing creature spun around me once more and began to drift away into the light of the sun. I reached out again, a desperate attempt to keep it with me, and watched as if slowly danced up my forearm, my shoulder, brushing against my forehead—

"Sara!"

I blinked, the peaceful trance ending in an instant, and I looked up to see Norm running towards me. A quick glance around told me that the glowing jellyfish was gone, as if it had never been there at all, but the tingle still present in the skin of my forehead told me otherwise.

Shaking my head to clear it, I jogged over to meet Norm halfway across the clearing.

My friend gave me a sheepish look. "I just wondered where you were; you came really far into the forest." I could tell that he wanted to say more, that he felt guilty, but I gave him a tight hug before he could start with any of that.

"Sorry if I worried you," I said quietly, closing my eyes when his response was to hug me tighter.

"You know I'll support you no matter what you decide, right?" he said just as softly, his hand coming up to cup the back of my head.

I thought back to the glowing creature that had found me just minutes ago, the feeling of comfort that had come along with it, and opened my eyes to stare over Norm's shoulder and into the trees. In the far distance I could see the glimpse of a metal fence. Instead of comforting me, as it usually did, the sight made me want to turn and look back in the direction the creature had been departing in before I reached out to touch it.

The words came out before I could stop myself:

"I'm going to do it, Norm." 

Norm froze, pulling back to look at me in the eye—Norm's Avatar was on the shorter end of average for Na'vi males, placing us at very nearly the same height.

"Sara, you don't have to just because Jake and I—"

I shook my head vehemently. "No, it's not because of you and Jake. I…"

The sunlight was growing stronger, now, illuminating the jungle even more as I turned to look deeper into the trees—into the future that was slowly unfolding before me, clearer and clearer with every breath I took.

"I have to stop letting fear keep me from moving forward."

* * *

Nighttime seemed to come far too quickly for my liking. To say I was a nervous wreck would be putting it lightly.

After tonight I would be in my Avatar body forever—no, I would _be_ my Avatar body, that body would _be_ Sara Mason. My human body would be an empty shell, cold and unfeeling—

I jumped when Norm's knock came. Opening the door took much more effort than it had that morning but I managed it.

No coffee was offered, this time.

I took one last look at the room that I had stayed in in for the past seven years. My bed, the desk that was still covered in research journals and xenobiology textbooks, the picture of an eighteen-year-old me standing in front of the Pandoran shuttle with my parents and my older brother that I kept on the bedside table…I was saying goodbye to all of it. Before I could second-guess the impulse I darted forward to grab my computer journal, tucking it into my pack along with the family photo and most of the textbooks. 

The hallway was too dark, too quiet, and I was surprised to feel Norm take my hand. His pulse was racing even more than mine and I swallowed before looking up at him with what I hoped was a reassuring smile.

The exit chamber appeared what felt like seconds later. Norm's hand released its death grip when we reached for oxygen masks, and for that I was grateful, because he had been holding my hand so tightly that the feeling had almost completely leeched out of it.

Jake was waiting just outside along with Neytiri; both of them were smiling.

Their calm made me feel a tiny bit better.

Not a lot better, mind you, but enough to ease the churning of my gut.

We walked out into the darkness of the Avatar training yard. A few minutes of walking later, four unfamiliar warriors melted out of the shadows, the stealth shocking in light of the fact that they were all riding huge direhorses that were snorting and stomping their large hooves.

Two of the warriors had our Avatars secured on their horses' backs. I wrapped my arms around myself at the sight of my lifeless Na'vi body because soon, that would be _me_. There was a chance I wouldn't survive, like Dr. Augustine, but I didn't let myself linger on that possibility.

"All right," Jake began. "You two are going to ride with those two over there and we'll meet you at the Tree."

I nodded, afraid that if I spoke I would start screaming. Norm nodded just as silently, his joy dampened by the gravity of the situation it seemed.

Jake helped Neytiri up onto Rogue—her own banshee Seze had died in the Battle, and Jake told me that the loss was too fresh for Neytiri to begin considering bonding with another—before swinging up behind her. I turned away rather than watch them leave, knowing that I would only be doing it to delay what came next. The warrior closest to me, a middle-aged woman with several large scars decorating her face, motioned for me to join her. When I did she helped me onto the direhorse with much more gentleness than I expected. Any sweet and fuzzy feelings towards her vanished when the direhorse suddenly broke into a heart-wrenching gallop.

I yelled and buried my face in my hands. Norm was laughing somewhere behind me, right along with the woman at my back. Oh, that's just wonderful; _laugh_ at the terrified human who's never been on a direhorse before. Assholes.

I closed my eyes to stave off the nausea that I pretended was from the rocking gait of the direhorse.

There was no going back for me. This was the path I was choosing to walk.

_Here we go._


	3. Goodbye

A few hours later found Norm and I lying naked on the roots of the Tree of Souls. On any other night the idea of being naked in front of Norm and Jake and several_ thousand_ Na'vi strangers—the foreign Clans hadn't left yet, it seemed—would have sent me running for the hills, but the unusual energy in the air made the embarrassment fade away as quickly as it had come. There was an almost electric current pouring into my skin from every little root tendril that had sprouted from the ground beneath me and curved around my body.

Through the slightly cloudy plastic of my oxygen mask I watched dozens of the small glowing jellyfish drift nearer and nearer. Just like that morning, I couldn't help but reach out as if to bring them closer.

Jake reached forward to intercept my fingers but Mo'at stopped him with a harsh sound. Neytiri whisperered something to him, her tone urgent, but I didn't have time to listen properly because the instant I touched the creature my mind went blank and my eyes slid shut without warning.

I vaguely felt my human arm fall limply on the ground beside my head and then my world blended into a flurry of color and—

—_light for a split second before my feet touched solid ground. When I opened my eyes I could see nothing but mist, nothing but a murky outline of what could be but wasn't yet. _

_The lack of oxygen mask on my face sent a wave of panic through me, washing away any desire to explore this strange place and replacing it with fear. _

_I made to cover my face but felt warmth surge through my fingers before I could. Something very much _not _me but still inside of me soothed the frayed nerves with three simple words:_

Don't be afraid.

_My body calmed enough for me to realize that I was standing on water, only I wasn't sinking like I should've been. It was like standing on a thick sheet of glass but when I knelt down to drift my fingers across the surface, it rippled like regular water should. I was going to investigate further when a familiar glowing tree appeared in my periphery. I looked up to see a pink-purple tree in the center of a small body of water—very different from the Tree of Souls both in shape and location but with the same undercurrent of power emanating from it. _

_My feet made no sound as they carried me across the water. _

_All in all, a very strange dream. Was this supposed to happen when transferring into an Avatar body? _

_As I pondered the idea I reached out to touch the long thick strands hanging from the expansive branches. They felt like thick ropes that were odd in the fact that they were both rough and silky smooth at the same time, effortlessly sliding through my long, blue fingers. _

Blue_ fingers?_

_Shrieking in surprise, I scrambled to the water's edge to get a better look at myself. _

_Large golden eyes stared back at me with such an expression of surprise that I could almost see my human self in their inhuman depths. _

_One of the strands of the tree slowly touched my forehead, independently mobile in a way that I had never seen or heard about in Ewya's trees. At the touch my body froze without my permission._ _A deep, almost painful feeling of unfurling began in my chest and spread throughout, searching and _studying_. _

_It was over in an instant and I fell backwards onto the grass. When I glanced down at myself it was to find my body completely unharmed despite the invasion I had so clearly felt. _

_What was _that_?_

_My sensitive nose caught the scent of something new, then, and I turned to see someone else walking across the water. _

_It was a human woman dressed in green cargo pants and a white tanktop, her long blonde hair tightly pulled back into a single braid that hung down her back. There was a sad smile on her freckled face and her hazel eyes stared up into mine with single-minded intensity. _

_Blinking was all it took for things to click. _

_The woman was _me_. _

_I spoke, and my voice echoed in the strange hazy nothingness that surrounded the tree. _

_"What is all this?" _

_My human form shook her head, touching her throat with her calloused fingers when I raised an eyebrow in silent question. She walked forward until the only thing that separated us was the line that linked the water and the grassy edge of the shore. The human reached out a hand, hesitant in a way that only emphasized how tiny and fragile she was, and I mirrored her. _

_Sadness boiled in my heart as I saw her struggle to speak again. What did she want to say? _

_A spark of light seemed to glimmer between our connected palms. Mine was so much larger than hers and yet when I looked closer I saw that the proportions and curves of our hands were the exact same. _

_Tears filled my human self's hazel eyes and a smile lit up her face. _

_The tree behind me shook, the sound reminiscent of a growl, and I turned to stare at the waving threads of glowing pink. One of the threads curved around to gently brush against my arm and I gasped as the strange floating feeling came back along with a humming sense of _rightness_ that hadn't been there before. _

_Human Sara retreated slightly, forcing me to lean forward to keep her hand locked in mine. _

_"Its time to go back," she explained. _

_I blinked at the sound of my human voice, so different than it had sounded in my human ears. _

_"Why couldn't you talk before?" I asked. _

_"You had to go through with it without knowing." _

_"Go through _what_?" _

_"Eywa's test. She doesn't lend her power to just _anyone_, you know. You have to have a good heart to pass her test…and you have a _good_ heart, Sara. I'm so happy for you," she said with a grin, a tear dripping down her face and creating a small ripple where it dropped into the water. I knelt down so that she didn't have to crane her neck to look at me, taking her other hand in mine. _

_"Then why are you crying?" I pressed, not liking the feeling of dread that was quickly replacing the euphoria of before. _

_Human Sara moved without warning, pressing a quick kiss to my forehead before pulling her hands free. _

_I was floating again, only this time it was on a physical level, taking me up into the air and away from the island. The human woman remained on that shore, staring at me as I was pulled away into the light. Her mouth moved but the rumbling of the tree was so loud in my ears that I couldn't hear what she said._

_I yelled to her, and it was then that everything snapped. _

_Darkness returned, swift and suffocating, and then—_

—I felt the cool bark against my exposed skin and heard the uncertain murmurs of voices around me. Norm's anxious one stood out among them:

"Jake, it's been too long! Is she—?"

"No!" Jake snapped.

It was with great effort that I opened my eyes, unsurprised to find them filled with tears. At first I wasn't sure which body I was in but the pressure of the ground against my tail and the sudden, complex influx of scents gave me my answer.

Jake's relieved face appeared above me upon hearing my shuddering gasp.

"Oh thank_ fuck_," he said in a rush, slumping down to press his forehead against mine—he was shaking, I realized. Lifting a hand to rest on the back of his head, I took a deep breath of his scent and felt my body relax ever so slightly. When he pulled away a few moments later, I looked over his shoulder, meeting Neytiri's gaze and feeling a rush of guilt. To my surprise, she didn't look angry at all, instead smiling warmly before turning her attention to Jake as he moved to stand beside her. 

Norm blinked back tears as he scooted closer. "I woke up in my Avatar and you weren't moving. It was almost like when Dr. Augustine…"

I looked over at my human body, the sight of blonde hair sending a jolt of pain shocking through me, strong enough to break the moment and give me energy enough to move. Ignoring Norm asking if I was all right, I pushed myself to my knees and weakly crawled so I was crouched beside my human body.

Long, unbound hair was strewn around her head and back, the arch of her spine fitting perfectly into the smooth curve of a nearby root. Her skin wasn't cold, not yet, but it wasn't quite warm either.

The tears fell when I saw the wetness glimmering on the human woman's freckled cheek.

A sharp, inhuman cry of grief ripped itself from my chest as I reached down to clutch the human body to my chest. I felt Norm's hand on my shoulder, trying to pull me away. My vision went red as I turned to snarl at him because he was trying to take the fragile body _away_ from me and I wasn't _ready_!

When he scrambled backwards I turned back and immediately refocused on my task of stroking loose wisps of blonde hair behind a small rounded ear.

I dimly registered that Neytiri and Mo'at were leading Norm away and that the crowd of Na'vi was slowly dispersing. Jake remained, even as the minutes turned into an hour, making sure not to touch me but close enough for me to reach out if I needed. Long braids brushed against my skin when I finally lay the human body back down, the thicker neural braid falling over my shoulder as I hunched forward to kiss the human woman's forehead. I wasn't ready, wouldn't ever be ready.

_I see you. _

* * *

_Electronic Journal_

* * *

_Name: _Sara Mason

_Location: _Avatar Shack

_Time/Date:_ 0924/November 21, 2154.

* * *

_Entry 3_

_It's done. _

_I'm in my Avatar body forever. _

_Should I feel happy? Should I be running around like a maniac, like Norm is currently doing? What should I_ do_ now, now that I had left everything that tied me to the human world behind? I hope that whoever is reading this now knows what I should have done because I'm drawing some major blanks. _

_Guilt was something I hadn't expected to feel but was currently feeling with a vengeance because I had thrown away my humanity. And the worst is that I can't even blame my decision on limitations my human body had, like Jake could, or on a fierce and proven passion for the Na'vi culture like Norm could. _

_What right did I have to be offered such a priceless gift when there were dozens of other Avatar drivers that would have sold a limb or three to be given the same chance? _

_My human body had carried me through twenty-five years of ups and downs, triumphs and sorrows, and in the span of an hour I had thrown it away for a shinier, taller model. What kind of person _does _that? _

_I know, I know, it's useless to lament after the fact, but how was I supposed to have prepared myself for this? I had never considered what it would feel like to see my human body—my flawed but perfectly_ functional_ human body—lying unwanted and cold on the ground next to me, and now it's all I can think about. _

_Gone were the freckles and wavy blonde hair that had allowed people to so easily link me to my parents. Thank God that I had gotten a chance to call them when two years into my stay on Pandora, I found out the news that Mom was sick. Through some miracle of technology I was able to say goodbye to her, and to tell Dad how much I loved him, how much I loved _both_of them. Tanner had been the one to send me the message, about a year later, that Dad had died in a car crash. My brother and I had never been close, and still aren't, but to know that we were the last ones…it connected us in a way that couldn't be undone. _

_What would my brother—my reserved, easily angered but _loyal_ brother—say if he knew what I had given up? _

_In any case, I ended up staying the night under the Tree of Souls next to my human body. I was too busy to sleep, too busy stroking her face as if to memorize her features. It was odd; through my human eyes my face was as familiar as breathing, but with my new Na'vi eyes it was the face of a stranger. So enhanced was my vision in comparison that it felt like I was seeing it for the first time. _

_The next day dawned and Neytiri and Mo'at came to help me send my human body off in the traditional Na'vi way. I don't think I'll ever be able to thank either of them enough—Neytiri held my hand the entire time and Mo'at, when it was over, gave me a hug that was so reminiscent of my mother's embrace that I burst into tears. She didn't release me as I expected, instead making soothing sounds and rubbing my back until I was finished. _

"_Do not hide your tears, Sara," Mo'at said in Na'vi as we parted and I hurriedly wiped my tears—Jake must have told her of my one-sided language skills at some point. "When we mourn, we can also know that what we mourn can never be lost; happiness and sadness live side by side within our hearts, always a reminder." _

_What happened next changed _everything_. _

_A voice calling my name made all three of us turn. Standing just beyond the boundary of the Tree of Soul's roots was an older Na'vi woman with bright face paint and hair tied into elaborate braids atop her head—so clearly _not _Omaticaya, if my knowledge of basic adornment was anything to go on. The stranger must have gotten some unspoken sign of approval from one of the two women at my side because she approached a moment later._

_Something about her face was familiar, though, and it's still running around my head as to where I would have seen her before. But maybe I'm still having trouble telling Na'vi apart—a lot of them still look the same to me even though I'm sure that to a Na'vi, each is entirely distinct. I can only hope that with time I start seeing those differences, too. _

_The woman introduced herself as Sänume, Tsahìk and Clan Leader of the Tipani Clan. Mo'at took charge and introduced me to the leader, and the look she gave me spoke volumes—she didn't want the Tipani Leader knowing I understood Na'vi, yet. _

"_I wish for Sara to come and join our Clan rather than stay with the Omaticaya." _

_Mo'at frowned but kept her composure, while Neytiri's ears pinned with distrust. _

"_Is that a wish or a demand?" she asked, not even attempting politeness if her tone was anything to go by. Mo'at sent a stern hiss to her daughter, who ducked her head in reluctant admonishment. _

_Sänume seemed amused at Neytiri's rudeness rather than offended—I was bombarded with an image of Dr. Augustine smirking down at a frustrated Jake in exactly the same way. Maybe their similar attitude was where the feeling of familiarity came from? _

"_Tam tam, __taronyutsyìp, let us be at peace in this sacred place. My offer is just that, an _offer_, and nothing more. Do the Omaticaya truly have such a low regard for one of their closest allies, to think us capable of kidnapping the unwilling?" _

_Mo'at's lips twitched and her tail made a curling gesture at the other woman that I had learned, from carefully observing Jake and Neytiri's interactions, was an expression of fondness. _

"_Of course not, __Sänume. The offer has been extended, and now Sara must decide," Mo'at placated, and Sänume's eyes widened as Mo'at turned to me expectantly, making it clear to all I wasn't waiting for a translation. _

"_You understand us?" the Tipani leader said. _

_Nodding, I replied with, "Tslolam," or 'I understand' before slowly continuing in broken Na'vi, "Understand perfect, but speak difficult. Dr. Augustine tried teach, but I learn slow and no practice." _

_Now here's where it gets interesting. At the mention of Dr. Augustine's name, the woman's eyes brightened in recognition, which made me question a _lot_ because Dr. Augustine had never once mentioned the Tipani Clan, not once, and she had been a very open book with her team—and especially me, as her personal assistant—when it came to the Na'vi people. _

_Sänume smiled widely, something akin to triumph in her eyes. "Well met, Sara of the Sky People. My offer is not without hidden motives: our Clan would benefit from having one of your kind with us, to better prepare us in case the human warriors return. The Omaticaya having all three of the dreamwalkers makes them a target from clans who would seek to destroy all remnants of the human insanity. If they see that the Tipani are also willing to accept a dreamwalker even after the Great Loss, it will do much to reassure them." _

_She left soon after that, but not before turning and reaching up to cup my face in her hands. _

"_I see so much of her in you." _

_No one asked to whom Sänume was referring to when she said 'she'—we all knew it was Dr. Grace Augustine._

_As I'm writing this, I realize that I've been played and yet I can't find it in myself to be angry at the blatant manipulation. Sänume had somehow been able to sense my affection for Dr. Augustine, somehow managed to pinpoint a weakness of mine—a powerful thirst for knowledge, especially in regards to my mentor—and exploit the hell out of it. _

_Neytiri knew, just as Jake and Norm knew when I told them, that I wouldn't let an opportunity to learn about Dr. Augustine's connection to the Tipani pass me by. I was scared to leave my friends, scared to live with a Clan in which I had no friends or familiar faces, but I was even more terrified to lose the chance to know more of Dr. Augustine's story. Maybe, if I did this, I would find some peace and not look for her in every Avatar face I saw or expect her to walk around the corner at any second with that fiery sharpness just waiting to be unleashed on the world. _

_Tomorrow, I'll be leaving with the Tipani Clan and starting a new life for myself on Pandora. I'll bring my electronic journal with me along with some of my human possessions—re: books and books and (you guessed it) some more books because becoming Na'vi doesn't mean I'm going to stop studying and learning all there is to know about Pandora's biology and numerous ecosystems. Neytiri said that she had some clothes for me to change into, to make my transition as easy as possible for the new clan. I guess she has a point; showing up in human clothing wouldn't give off a very good impression to a people notorious for disliking anything human-related._

_I'll also be sending copies of my journal entries to Max back at Hell's Gate, on the off chance this laptop malfunctions and I'm unable to access the files. It's one of the fancy top-notch research journals—solar powered, fully waterproof, damage-resistant and even equipped with a video feature which should come in handy if I ever wanted to make a video log—but I'm not taking any chances because, like Jake's logs, my entries could prove vital if it ever came down to promoting the truth about Pandora and the insanity of pretending that the Na'vi are nothing but savages waiting to be colonized. _

_Time to sign off; it's dinnertime, apparently, and Jake is miming shooting me with an arrow in response to me asking for a few more minutes. Norm is busy pretending to die of hunger to my right. Pained groaning sounds and rolling around on the ground included, the drama-queen. _

_See what I have to deal with? Maybe me leaving isn't such a bad idea after all…_

_(I'm going to miss the hell out of them, warts and all.) _

_End of Entry 3_


	4. Setting Out

The morning air was still as I sat on the large root of the Tree of Souls, staring down at the small crevice covered in leaves and flower petals where my human body was buried in the way of the Na'vi.

_Energy is only borrowed, and one day you have to give it back. _

Jake had said it in one of his video logs and it was only now that I realized how true that statement was. No matter how hard you tried to avoid it, Death always came to collect in the end. 

I said one final, silent goodbye before getting to my feet and grabbing my pack. The Tree’s glow seemed almost muted by the blinding rays of the early morning sun. Around me the forest was mostly quiet, my pointed ears perking up as they registered tiny sounds that would have been a part of the silence in my human body.

The calm buzz of a large insect reached me, and when I looked I caught of glimpse of its brightly colored wings glinting as it dipped out of sight. A nearby stream rushed past, the sounds of Na'vi children eating breakfast quickly accompanied by exuberant splashes as they abandoned their food to play in the water. I even heard the snorts and snuffles of a direhorse that was drifting a little too far from the herd.

Soft footsteps came from behind me. My entire body tensed and I turned my head to zero in on the source.

I wasn’t surprised to find Sänume standing there. Like most Na'vi females she was practically nude, with numerous beaded necklaces covering her breasts and a loincloth hanging around her waist. Things that she hadn’t been wearing when we first met were the armbands covering nearly the entire expanse of her forearms and the ornate headpiece decorated with carved pieces of stone and brightly colored feathers.

Even without the armbands and headpiece I had known that this woman was a leader just by the way she walked, the way she held herself when she approached me yesterday.

Sänume touched her forehead and murmured, “_Oel ngati kameie_,” before joining me on the root. I repeated the saying back to her after taking a moment to remember how to move my hand in the right way.

We stood in silence for a while. Sänume’s tail slowly waved back and forth behind her calves and the beads on her loincloth clinked as she shifted her weight. It took me a moment or two for it to register that she was a few inches taller than me.

Realizing I was staring at her like an idiot, I looked up into the Tree’s softly glowing strands that waved gently in the breeze. Several minutes later I heard Sänume move past me to kneel beside the place where my human body was buried. Out of the corner of my eye I watched as she touched the soft leaves with her long fingers.

"Why me?" I asked in English. "Norm would do just as well for political reasons—any particular reason you chose me?" I finished, hoping that my gut feeling about her speaking my language beyond the basics was correct. The older Na’vi was silent for a moment, continuing to stare down at the spot where my human body lay.

After a few long moments, she stood and faced me.

"The night you awoke as Na’vi, I saw in you the desire to _understand _and not simply experience,” Sänume replied in heavily accented but otherwise fluent English. “I choose you over your friend because you carry something _more_—you possess a will strong enough to shake the earth and a mind sharp enough to contain it. Politics aside, I truly believe that my Clan would be stronger with you added to its ranks. Stronger and _smarter_."

I stared at her. “So you speak English,” was my idiotic reply, but Sänume laughed with genuine amusement in her eyes. 

“It seems both of us underestimated the other; a mistake I will not repeat.”

“Me neither,” I replied in Na’vi, and her sharp canines gleamed as she reached out a hand to me. Taking it was easy as breathing, and the moment we touched I knew that I was making the right choice. Sweet-talking aside, there was a dagger-sharp mind behind the woman’s carefully neutral words that, oddly enough, put me at ease.

Sänume gave my hand a squeeze before stepping back and gesturing for me to join as she moved towards the well-worn path leading to the temporary tents set up a short distance from the Tree of Souls.

Smiling, I moved forward and fell into step beside her.

* * *

Jake and Neytiri weren't surprised to see me walking alongside the Tipani leader when the Tipani arrived at the new Omaticaya Hometree.

“Talk about ruthless, dangling information about Grace in front of you like that,” Jake grumbled, ignoring Neytiri's warning look. Shaking her head, the Na'vi woman moved to stand before me a moment later, staring deep into my eyes for a moment before giving me a short nod and turning away to converse with the Tipani Clan leader in low, rapid-fire Na’vi that even I had trouble catching when I wasn’t actively trying to understand.

I was more than a little surprised by the rather curt goodbye but Jake leaned over to console me almost with:

"It means she likes you; she only does that when she doesn’t want to say goodbye.”

I nodded, suddenly too nervous to smile, and his face creased in concern as he grabbed my hand. I frowned at the spark of heat that flared through me at the touch, unexpected and foreign, and wondered if he felt it too if his expression shifting for a split second was any indication. He dropped my hand as if it had burned him, confirming my suspicion, and both of us stared at each other for a moment before Jake seemed to remember why he had reached for me in the first place. 

"You don't have to go if you don't want to," he said quietly, his tone low and serious in the way it only ever was when we were alone.

I smiled. "It's true."

Jake sighed, his shoulders slumping ever so slightly. "But you're still going anyway, I know," he said, his voice raspy with emotion. Ignoring the strange sensation that appeared when I did, I reached out to take his hand.

Physical touch wasn't something I was exactly comfortable with but with Jake it had never been an issue and it was something that still confused me to this day. Even with Elijah_—_saying the name, even to myself, made my chest tighten with years-old grief_—_I hadn't felt such instant connection and they had both been just as open with their affection. 

Jake's hand squeezing mine brought me back; the look in his golden eyes let me know he knew exactly why I had gone so still and silent and the warmth there let me know that he understood, as always. I sent him a weak smile and he opened his mouth to say something when Norm's voice broke through:

"You got everything, Sara?"

I took a hurried step back, taking a deep breath and shaking off the lingering tendrils of sadness.

"Yeah," I replied, bending down to shoulder my pack. As Norm approached, Jake let out a frustrated huff of air and turned to join Neytiri in her conversation with Sänume. Norm frowned at the former marine's back and sent me a questioning look. I shrugged, adjusting the straps so that the heavy pack rested more comfortably against me.

Once I had finished, Norm’s arms moved to hold me so tightly that it was hard to breathe. 

"Be sure to visit, okay?" he asked after we stepped away.

I nodded, moving towards the Tipani direhorses as Sänume gestured for me to hurry. "Of course!" I promised, sending him a cheeky salute before running to catch up.

“You ride with Lielu,” the Tipani leader explained, pointing me in the right direction.

I jogged over to the rider in question, relieved to find that the direhorse wasn't nearly as huge and threatening as it had been in my human form and surprised to see the rider eagerly holding out a hand to help me. Lielu gave me a small smile that I was quick to return—she looked around my Avatar’s biological age (twenty, the scientists who had monitored my Avatar body’s development told me), maybe a bit older if I had to guess. Her eyes widened with barely retrained curiosity at the sight of my hand; understandable, seeing as I had five fingers instead of the usual four.

After looking at my fingers for a second too long she pulled me up onto the direhorse in front of her. I quickly gripped the large creature's shoulders with my knees as the young woman adjusted herself to accommodate me.

By some unspoken signal among the people of the Tipani clan, everyone set off at the exact same time.

Banshees shrieked as they took to the air, grass being flattened as their powerful wings beat against the pull of gravity. I heard Sänume’s joyful cry as she spun her banshee in a playful loop. The Omaticaya clan whooped and shouted their goodbyes as we moved rapidly away from them and into the undergrowth. I chanced a look back, just in time to see Norm and the other children running after the direhorses even though they knew it was pointless. The last thing I saw was Norm picking up a little girl and putting her on his shoulders, her bright face alight with glee at having acquired a new, albeit oversized, playmate. Jake and Neytiri were standing very close at Hometree’s entrance, their tails loosely intertwined as they waved.

And then they were gone, hidden from sight as we entered the maze of trees and foliage. The only sound was the breathing of the direhorses and their heavy hooves pounding a relentless rhythm on the moss. I faced forward, trying my best to commit that happy scene of farewell to memory.

The banshees were soon gone from sight as they soared above the thick canopy that blocked the sun from sight. Instead of rays of runshine, the deeper parts of the jungle had a muted green daytime glow, the sight of which made me look around in wonder.

Trees bigger than anything I had ever seen, except for Hometree of course, towered over us, large protruding roots creating a constantly curving obstacle course for us to navigate. Vibrantly colored flowers hung from the trees’ vines; their thick velvety petals diffused a heavy flowery fragrance that lingered on our skin long after we had left them behind.

Lielu kept taking a breath as if to speak but then whenever I turned to face her, expectant, she'd look away again. I cleared my throat after an hour or so of this awkward silence.

“You have questions?” I asked in Na’vi, that phrase coming easily enough considering how many times Dr. Augustine had asked it of me after explaining a particularly complex Na’vi language concept.

Lielu’s entire body seemed to deflate ever so slightly—not the reaction I had been expecting at _all_.

“So you _do _speak Na’vi,” she lamented. “I didn’t think so, considering that you’re a dreamwalker, but my brother was fairly certain that you did—I owe him a new knife sheath, now,” she grumbled, but sent me a quick smile to let me know she wasn’t angry. 

“Help I you make?” I offered, inwardly cringing at what I knew was terrible Na’vi but unable to get over the crippling nerves that struck every time I was put in a place to speak it. Lielu frowned, sorting out the errors before giving me a knowing look.

“Let me guess, your understanding is much better than your speaking?”

I frantically nodded. 

“I am the same with _‘Ìnglìsì_,” the Na’vi woman assured me. “My aunt and mother are able to speak as quickly as the Sky People but I am like a _baby_; understanding but not able to speak properly!”

“Not fun,” I agreed with a scowl. She patted my shoulder before carefully guiding the direhorse around a muddy hole.

“Don’t worry, I will help you. It will be much easier than it would be if you didn’t understand Na’vi—all you need to do is speak more.”

“So, you yourself tell me?” I attempted, laughing a bit at the sight of Lielu’s nose wrinkling in distaste.

“_Nga läivawk ko_,” was her almost desperate correction, and I couldn't help but burst into giggles. It didn't take long for Lielu to start laughing with me, which drew the attention of several riders around us. They sent mildly concerned looks in our direction before returning their attention to the path ahead.

“So, tell me about yourself,” I asked again, this time correctly, and Lielu nodded.

“Better, thank Ewya.”

The relief in her tone made me start laughing all over again. 

* * *

_Electronic Journal_

* * *

_Name: _Sara Mason

_Location: _Tipani Hometree

_Time/Date:_ 0100/November 22, 2154

* * *

_Entry 4_

_Everyone around me is asleep and I'm currently in a hammock on the ground level, trying to get my thoughts down so I can get some sleep. I'll go into more detail on the Tipani Hometree tomorrow because I cant really see it clearly in the pitch blackness of night but from what I’ve been able to see thanks to the dim glow of the bio-luminescent plants, I can say that this tree is _enormous_. It literally disappears into the darkness of the sky above; even with my new enhanced eyesight I can't see the top. _

_Lielu and I continued to talk and exchange information as we traveled, and I learned that her brother Kinak was several years younger than her and more than a little eager to complete his warrior training. Traditionally, the Tipani made their men and women wait a bit longer to become taronyu—most weren’t allowed to go through the trial until twenty or twenty-one years old. In return, I told Lielu a bit about my life in Hell’s Gate, from Avatar training to my days spent in the lab.  
  
My spoken Na’vi was still pretty damn bad but hey, practice makes perfect, so hopefully with time things will improve. Thank God for Lielu and her seemingly endless supply of patience. I wasn’t surprised at all when I asked her what her role in the Clan was and she revealed that she wasn’t a warrior at all, but the head direhorse handler and riding teacher. No wonder she was so willing to put up with my mistakes—her _job _was to work with young direhorses and Na’vi children._

_When we arrived at the Tipani Hometree an entire day of riding later, I was shocked to see how many clan members there were; hundreds of women and men that had stayed behind to guard Hometree. Small children ran alongside the direhorses as they shouted happy greetings to the returning warriors. _

_What’s more, Lielu told me that the Tipani was the only clan whose population resided in more than one place—they had four villages outside of Hometree, situated a few hours ride in each of the cardinal directions, each ruled by a Na’vi elder personally selected by _ _Sänume. This gave them a more in-depth knowledge of the land in all directions and allowed for more variety in regards to trade between the villages and Hometree. _

_Lielu said that there had never been conflict between the geographically separate groups in all the years as a Clan, which surprised me, but she went on to explain with: “We are Tipani, even if we live in different places, and that bond is stronger than petty disagreements.” _

_Sänume had arrived with the banshees_ _long before we did and was in the process of greeting her people when we arrived. Everyone, from the youngest child to the oldest clan member, was individually acknowledged. I caught people staring at me and sneering in disapproval at the sight of my five-fingered hands and strange blend of human/Na’vi features. When the murmurs about the dreamwalker among them reached a distracting volume_ _Sänume_ _wasted no time in jumping onto a ledge that must have been specifically created for that purpose._

_“My people! Hear me, for I have news,” she began, and the easy, practiced cadence of the opening statement made me wonder if it was how she always began her announcements. _

_She went on to explain my adoption into the Clan, making sure to mention my close friendship with Jakesully—she used the title Toruk Makto, as he was called during the Battle. The name-drop contributed to a collective softening towards me but I definitely saw more than a few unhappy faces even after all was said and done. I wasn’t too shocked at that—I had known from the moment I accepted the offer to join the Tipani that it would take more than _ _Sänume snapping her fingers to get her people to fully accept me. _

_After giving the command for the Clan to rest, _ _Sänume_ _pulled me aside while everyone else began made their way to the vast collection of sleeping hammocks—situated both on the ground level and much higher up. _

_"Tomorrow your training begins,” she explained, sending a hand signal to Lielu from across the central area of Hometree. The young woman moved to join us, greeting _ _Sänume with an easy familiarity that made me wonder what their relationship was. _

_“My niece,” Sänume offered; the woman's eyes didn't miss _anything_, something that I admired and feared in equal measure. _

_"Who will teach me?" I asked, relieved when neither of the women gave me a sign that I had made any mistakes with my Na’vi. Lielu gave her aunt a significant look and the older woman nodded before turning to me. _

_“It is still being decided. Lielu will join you in a moment.” _

_A clear dismissal, sure, but not an unkind one. _

_I waited by the winding root that served as a staircase of sorts, staring up into the dark depths of the upper levels and pretending I couldn’t hear the soft hiss of Lielu and _ _Sänume whispering to each other, the younger Na’vi becoming increasingly agitated while her aunt remained unmoved. Finally, Lielu threw up her hands and stomped away from Sänume, her face creased with worry for a moment before she forced a smile. _

_“Come, you can stay in the hammock next to mine,” she said as she led me to the hammock area on the lowest level, her tone making it clear that the subject of what she and her aunt had been discussing was very firmly off limits for the time-being. _

_Of course, I hadn't gone to sleep immediately as Lielu had done, instead whipping out this bad boy and typing as fast as I could without making too much noise. _

_Is it weird that I'm actually _excited _to start training? I mean, I guess it isn’t _too _crazy of a concept; I had always enjoyed the Avatar Program training, after all. I was expecting to get my ass kicked at first, because no amount of RDA combat training could prepare you for the much more fluid but still _brutal _Na’vi fighting style, but I don’t think I’ll be a _complete _lost cause. I consistently had the fastest obstacle course time among the Avatar drivers and was pretty good at throwing knives…that should count for _something_, right? _

_I guess I’ll find out tomorrow. _

_In the meantime—time to test whether Na’vi hammocks are more comfortable than human ones. _

_End of Entry 4_


	5. Brother

My internal clock woke me at dawn; I was so used to waking up early to get a head start on sample analysis that going back to sleep was impossible once my eyes were open. Lielu and the others around me were still deeply asleep, much to my surprise. Maybe they were letting themselves sleep in a bit after traveling all day yesterday—if only _my _body would get on board with that plan.

I gave myself a silent pat on the back when I managed to slide out of my hammock without waking anyone around me. My next move was to follow the golden glow peeking from around the thick woven curtains separating the hammocks from the rest of the ground floor. My throat released an instinctual hiss when a sliver of direct sunlight hit my face—the sound made me pause in shock because I wasn’t quite used to the fact that my body was more reactive when it came to extreme emotions. When my eyes adjusted I froze, because I wasn’t alone in the central meeting area and my sound of displeasure hadn’t gone unoticed. 

Dozens of pairs of golden eyes stared back at me. I had been right in assuming that the travelers were being allowed to sleep in but completely wrong in thinking I would walk out to an empty Hometree. How had I forgotten that Hometree was made up of more than the warriors that had answered Toruk Makto’s call?

All around there were small groups of Tipani clan members; women with half finished weaving in their long fingers, children holding leaves with faces drawn on with charcoal, sticks stuck through the base of the leaf to create arms and legs. A group of men carefully sharpened arrowheads, their golden eyes watching me warily. 

Swallowing the overwhelming urge to step back and disappear behind the woven screen, I lifted my chin and scanned the room, deliberately making eye contact with every single person still staring at me.  
  
“_Rewon lefpom_,” I said politely, ignoring the pit of nerves gnawing at my gut. I knew I had said the greeting right—‘good morning’ wasn’t the most complicated of phrases—but the fear of being judged for my accent and lack of confidence continued to claw at me. The silence that followed didn’t help that feeling; it was filled not with words but with widened eyes and murmurs that didn’t carry enough for me to hear them properly.

In the end, it was the giggles of children that broke the tension; the group of children had resumed their play.

A sense of normalcy returned at the sound, as if the children’s lack of distrust was a good sign rather than simply a demonstration of the naivety of youth. The men began to talk amongst themselves as they worked on their weapons, teeth flashing as they laughed at one of the younger men who was having trouble with the sharpening process. Other clan members continued on their way through the central meeting area; some stopped to chat to their friends but others moved with single-minded focus. A Tipani woman close to me glanced over at the children as she sewed a layer of leather over the wooden skeleton of a basket, her fingers not missing a stitch even as she carefully observed their play.

I decided to chance walking through the shared space, not staring too obviously at anyone but also taking the rare opportunity to watch a Clan go through their morning routines without having any tasks of my own to complete. Who knew when I would get this chance again?

Too soon I reached the entrance of Hometree and lost my chance to observe without making my gawking too obvious. The early morning sun was warm on my bare skin—I had donned one of the outfits Lielu gifted me last night before going to sleep, an outfit that covered more than I was expecting, considering the attire I was used to seeing on Na’vi women. The top was a sturdy, sparsely decorated triangle of leather that stayed attached to my body thanks to several cords I could cinch around my neck and ribcage. The loincloth was wider than I had expected and ended in a beaded fringe that brushed against my knees as I walked.

The jungle around the Tipani Hometree was both similar and different from the one surrounding the Omaticaya Clan. I recognized most of the plants but there were some new ones that made me itch to grab a sample bag and examine them under a microscope. I’m sure I can find them in one of the many Pandoran fauna and flora textbooks that Dr. Augustine had written over the years—never ‘officially’ published by Earth standards but the final word on Pandoran biology in Hell’s Gate.

My ears perked up when I heard a collection of voices behind me, both male and female, discussing their meeting with someone named Citra at the eastern training grounds. I looked over to see a small group of teenagers walking by with an assortment of weapons in their hands. Feeling impulsive and more than a little curious, I waited until they had gotten a safe distance away before following.

I tried not to feel guilty as I carefully trailed behind them—Sänume had said I would train, so it wasn’t like I was breaking any rules by going to the training ground, right?

As I went, I couldn’t help but marvel at the feeling of traversing through the jungle in my Na’vi form. Being linked through the Avatar link beds allowed for most sensations to transfer, sure, but there was always the hum in the back of the brain that reminded you that you weren’t quite connected—not _fully_, anyway. Being completely and permanently in my Avatar body made everything feel so much more _real_.

The trees towered over the path, large and glorious, and if I listened I could hear sounds of creatures scurrying and calling to each other within the branches that loomed overhead. The moss underfoot sank under my weight in the most interesting way, both sticky and dry at the same time. It was weird to feel my tail stretch out behind me when I padded across a narrow log but at the same time it felt natural.

Finally, about ten minutes later, the group of teenagers unknowingly led me to a large clearing dedicated to everything warrior-related. Several groups of Na’vi men and women practiced with bows and arrows, frowning in concentration as they were coached in the proper technique. Off to the side, two young Na’vi men were wrestling while another pair strapped painted armor—it looked like bone to me, though I was too far to know for sure—to their arms and chests. I heard the barking orders of a woman who stood with her back to me; my ears unconsciously flattened as the woman's voice pierced the air with a shrill authority.

I was about to step back so the large leaves of a nearby bush could hide me from sight when the woman’s ears flicked in my direction. She turned to pin me with a steely stare before I could so much as blink. The only positive aspect of my suddenly hellish experience was that the young Na'vi in front of her looked relived to have the woman’s attention somewhere else for the moment.

The woman held up a hand; so great was her influence that the entire training area went silent in less than three seconds—I had to assume that this was Citra, then. I was silent, too, but from _terror _because I felt like a piece of meat being dangled in front of group of very hungry predators. Fuck, fuck, fuck—

"So, _you're _the girl that Grace told me about. The great _Sara Mason_,” Citra drawled in English.

The cadence and sarcasm pulled me back in time, back to hours, days, months and _years _spent navigating Dr. Augustine’s moods and atrocious social skills. The stranger could have been a native English speaker, something that shocked me more than I can express—even Sänume, whose English was some of the best I had ever seen on Pandora, had a very strong Na’vi accent and didn’t speak as fluidly. 

The woman snorted derisively, walking forward and examining my face with large golden eyes that were both wary and wise.

"What, surprised? You must be forgetting that Grace was here for years before you came to Pandora; she traveled to many of the clans before settling with the Omaticaya. I know your kind—_her _kind—better than most."

Okay, so she had learned English from Dr. Augustine, but how had she learned it so _well_? You didn’t get that kind of fluency from just a few months learning a language, no matter how skilled or dedicated of a learner you were.

More importantly, why did she say Dr. Augustine's name with such resentment?

Citra went on, interrupting the endless internal questions with:

“Scared and skinny but desperate to learn…Grace said it was like looking at a younger version of herself," she explained as she carelessly handled my tail in her hands and ran her hand along my face, fingers lingering on the eyebrows—a trait the Na’vi lacked, seeing as they had no body hair.

I felt tears welling up at the words because Dr. Augustine had _loved_ me, in her own way, but it almost didn’t matter because she was _gone_—

Citra sighed and stepped back. "I know why you're here and I'm going to tell you right now that you don't have the stomach for it. You'll die trying to pass the test, just like Grace did with Eywa’s test, so I suggest you go back to Hometree and find some other way to contribute."

The woman waved her hand, a clear dismissal. 'Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do."

I was sure that if the woman had taken one look at me and said that last bit, I would have been cowed into submission and run back to Hometree with my tail between my legs—_literally_—but she hadn’t done that. No, instead she had talked about Dr. Augustine’s death like it was _nothing_. She had the absolute fucking _nerve _to simplify my mentor’s life, cutting out all the brilliance and life and narrowing it down to failing a _test_?

My ears pinned as a furious snarl escaped my gritted teeth. The sound was loud enough to slice through the sounds of warriors resuming their training and cause the field to fall into silence once more. Citra’s head lifted from where she had been speaking to a shorter Na’vi trainee next to a grass-stuffed target but she didn’t turn around.

“You don’t know _my _kind at all,” I seethed in English, spotting a basket full of daggers and reaching for one as I strode forward. My heart raced in my chest as I took careful aim and let the dagger fly towards the target. I acted too quickly for caution or hesitation to take root and that was probably why I succeeded—my body knew what to do after so many years of training. 

Citra was mid-turn when the dagger buried itself in the target a few inches from her head. Her entire body went still, eyes flicking to the dagger before locking onto me. I continued forward; the sheer amount of rage made every muscle in my body quiver and twitch.

“Dr. Augustine must have been a terrible teacher, because you forgot something pretty damn important,” I hissed as I reached her, ignoring the fact that the training field had gone deathly quiet.

“And what is that?” Citra hissed back, her ears pinned back as she stepped closer, so close that we were almost touching—she stood a few inches shorter than me but that did little to diminish the fire in her eyes.

I slowly leaned over and, without breaking eye contact, pulled the dagger from the target.   
  
“_Our _kind doesn’t let the possibility of failure stop us from trying, from trying over and over and _over _again until we succeed. _You’re _giving up before we’ve even started—what does that say about _your _kind?”

Suddenly, the tip of a knife was pressed against my rib cage while a callous-roughened hand came from behind me to circle around my neck. Surprise caused the dagger to slip from my fingers and fall uselessly at my feet. Adrenaline pumped into my veins at the touch of the blade because I hadn’t heard the person coming and that was _scary_. 

The distinct scent of a Na’vi male permeated my senses when I collected myself enough to take a deep breath. Heat radiated from the form, making me wonder if the same adrenaline was rushing through him as it was through me.

“_Lonu_, _‘itan_,” Citra said softly, the lack of anger surprising me, and the Na’vi behind me let the knife linger for a second longer—making it clear he was reluctant to leave me unscathed—before obeying the woman and releasing me. I immediately turned to face my attacker, not sure what I was planning to do but determined to at least memorize his face so I could get revenge later, but the moment I looked up into his eyes my entire world seemed to spin.

The young man standing behind me was the one who had saved my life.

Wait, Citra had called him _‘itan_. Oh shit, that meant that the guy who had saved me was also her _son. _

It couldn’t possibly get _any _worse—

“_Kinak_!” Lielu’s voice sounded from across the cleaning and all of us turned to see her sliding down from a direhorse, shoulders stiff with anger as she glared at the young Na’vi who had stepped back to stand beside Citra.

“Kinak?” I asked, hoping beyond hope that another Na’vi would respond, that maybe Lielu was speaking to someone else. Of course, luck wasn’t remotely on my side at the moment, and I felt a resigned chill skitter across my skin when the young man—Lielu’s _brother_—looked at me upon hearing his name. His gaze was cold and unyielding; so different from the calm gentleness I had witnessed when he examined my wound and, soon after, gathered me into his arms.

Well, I was wrong—it most definitely _could_ get worse. 


	6. Tsaheylu

Kinak’s eyes remained locked on mine as Lielu approached. I was tempted to look away and escape the bitterness in his gaze but pride demanded that I stand my ground. The Na’vi valued strength above all else—if I let Kinak scare me it would only prove my presumed weakness.

I was still adjusting to how _sharp _the features of the Na’vi men were. I was used to interacting with the women—namely Mo’at and Neytiri—and so their softer, more rounded features were what I was used to and could find beauty in. The Na’vi men, on the other hand, were all harsh angles and muscle.

Kinak in particular was difficult to label in regards to attractiveness. The adrenaline still coursing through my body caused a confusing amount of my focus to zero in on the slight parting of his lips and how it might feel to press myself against his muscular chest. But that reaction was easily explained away—my Avatar body was more susceptible to primal feelings, and right then the instincts were screaming that the male before me had proven his strength and therefore was suitable for…well, _that_. 

The human side of me was less than enthused, however, and so those feelings were quickly put aside and placed in the box of things that continued to baffle me about this new body of mine.

The Na’vi warriors at the field began to disperse when it became more apparent that the conflict wouldn’t be ending any time soon. There were lingering glances in our direction but no outward frustration or resentment even though we were clearly interrupting their training sessions.

I won’t lie and pretend I didn’t feel a huge burst of smugness when Lielu reaching us made Kinak break the eye contact first—his sense of self-preservation was stronger than his pride, it seemed. He tried to maintain the stoic coldness but even I could see the slumping of his shoulders in the face of his older sister’s fury.

“She is to be one of us and yet you treat her like this?” Lielu snarled in Na’vi, including her mother in her glare as her tail angrily whipped behind her. Kinak didn’t react beyond crossing his arms over his chest and Citra’s expression hardened.

“Watch your tone, '_ite_. You forget that Sara was the one to attack first.”

Lielu bared her teeth. “_You _dishonor Sa’nu’s memory by treating one of her students like dirt under your foot!”

Pain sagged at Citra’s face as the woman took a small step back. Kinak hissed at his sister in reprimand but Lielu shook it off with a straightening of her spine. I for one was beyond confused and curious because all of this was new for me and my scientist-brain was itching to investigate.

Lielu had known Dr. Augustine—had loved her enough to call her ‘mom’.

“She is one of them; it is reason enough,” Kinak declared. His voice held the same soothing husk as it had that day in the forest and in any other situation I would have admired the smooth cadence of it. The asshole probably had a great singing voice; even my anger couldn’t keep me from admitting it.  
  
“Not true,” I piped up in hesitant Na’vi and promptly flinched when three pairs of eyes honed in onto me. Gathering up all of my courage, I turned to Kinak and lifted my chin to better look at him as I continued:

“_Not _enough. Every human different, just as Na’vi different. I no fight well but I want learn and _will _learn, even if you no person to teach,” I finished, directing that last line to Citra, who looked equal parts sad and pissed off. “But I prefer _you_ teach. I…”

Letting out a sound of frustration, I went on in English, the words rushing out of me like an overfull lake finally breaking through the dam containing it.

“I don’t know what went on between you and Dr. Augustine but you clearly _knew_ her. She wasn’t perfect, not by a long shot, but she was the closest I had to a mother on Pandora and I…I want to make her proud, even now, even though I know she’s gone. I don’t want to be _just _a scientist or _just _Dr. Augustine’s assistant—I want to be _Sara_, even if I’m not exactly sure who she is yet. I can’t promise that I’ll be the best warrior the Tipani has ever seen but I _can _promise to work hard.”

I finished my impromptu speech staring intently at the ground, cheeks burning and my stomach tied into knots at the thought of what the response to that would be. Citra would have understood every word but I wasn’t as sure of Kinak and Lielu’s English listening proficiency; I was willing to bet they understood more than I would have liked.

The silence that followed was so tense that I was afraid to walk forward for fear of hitting my nose on it.

Finally, almost a full minute later, Citra said: 

“At least you already know how to throw knives—one less thing to teach,” she mused, and when I looked up in shock it was to find her staring at me with a distinct lack of anger in her gaze. 

I smiled slightly. “Dr. Augustine never knew that I practiced in the lab—I used the first years’ rejected project models as targets. She was always so confused as to how the models kept mysteriously breaking.”

Citra’s eyes crinkled as a surprised chuckle escaped her. “That must have driven her insane.”

“Oh it did.”

Kinak let out a choked growl at that. When I turned to see what was wrong he was already walking away, shoulders tight and hands tightly clenched into fists. Lielu made to follow her brother but Citra put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.

“Leave him. Your softness will do him no good right now,” she murmured in Na’vi. Her eyes were also on her retreating son’s back, which is why she missed the hurt flicker across her daughter’s face. I saw it though, and without thinking I reached my tail over to touch Lielu's leg. Her own tail touched mine briefly, a gesture of gratitude, before she stepped away. 

After telling me to meet her outside Hometree tomorrow at dawn, Citra disappeared into the forest in the same direction as Kinak. I glanced over at Lielu, not sure what to say, but the hurt from before was carefully hidden.

“You did well,” she assured me. “Sa’nok likes you, even though she will never admit it.” 

“At least one of them does,” I muttered in English, more to myself than to Lielu, but of course she heard me thanks to crazy good Na’vi hearing.

“Kinak is my brother and I love him, but he wears his hatred of dreamwalkers like a badge of honor when in reality it is nothing but a poison,” Lielu said softly before reaching over to link arms with me and gently steer me towards her direhorse. The animal was patiently waiting by the trees, nuzzling at the grass in search of flowers.

“Why he hate?” I asked, forcing myself to revert back to Na’vi even though it was clear that Lielu could understand me when I spoke English—like me in the sense that she was able to understand the second language even if speaking didn’t come as naturally. 

Lielu sighed. “I…I do not think it is my story to tell. I know that it is cruel to mention such things and refuse to explain, but understand that it is still a subject of great sorrow for my family. I can only advise you to give them time—all stories come to the surface, eventually, even the ones that seem deeply buried.”

Her tone made it clear that the subject was closed. Despite my burning desire to press her, I forced my mouth shut and nodded instead. The young woman at my side laughed at my expression.

“Samuke told me that you are a scientist—I can see it, now. You chase knowledge like a hunter chases their prey.”

I rolled my eyes at her teasing comparison and she gave me a playful flick of her tail before gesturing to the direhorse before us.

“Come, knowledge-hunter. Today, you learn to ride.”

* * *

It took us nearly an hour to get to the direhorse fields, as they were on the far side of Hometree and carefully hidden in the undergrowth—a deterrent for predators, as it was protected from attacks on the ground and difficult to infiltrate from above.

The entire ride was spent wondering how the hell I would ever get to the point where riding a huge six-legged horse was as natural as breathing. It only took a brief observation of the other riders that passed us to see that while most adult Na’vi were skilled direhorse riders, Lielu was an _amazing _one. It was no wonder that she was the head direhorse trainer.

“_Kaltxì_, my little riders,” Lielu called out when we walked past the sturdy wooden gates and were bombarded by three little Na’vi children. Behind them were a few teenagers who shook their heads at the exuberance of their much smaller peers. The thing I noticed right away that was different from the warrior-training field was the calm that permeated every little thing. Stepping into the place felt peaceful, like what I remember old libraries being like back on Earth.

“Not _so _little, _karyu_,” one of the older girls said with a sheepish roll of her eyes. Lielu smiled fondly, approaching her and cradling the still-maturing face in her hands.

“You’re growing so fast, Rini—are you stealing your brother’s food when he isn’t looking?”

The teenagers guffawed at the joke, one in particular—a boy I assumed was the brother in question. Rini remained unaffected, shrugging noncommittally.

“Only when he neglects his food in order to sing songs about your beauty.”

I let out a snort of laughter when the boy stopped laughing, his face so full of horror and embarrassment that I couldn’t help myself. The group joined me in laughter, not seeming to realize that I was an outsider in favor of laughing good-naturedly at their friend. Meanwhile, the boy was blushing so hard that his entire face was a vivid shade of purple.

Lielu gave the poor kid a break by saying, “I’m sure Terul’s songs are lovely, but luckily for him we won’t ask him to sing them just yet—we have _pa’li _that are in need of riding, don’t we?”

I watched, thoroughly impressed, as Lielu seamlessly transitioned from group to group, assigning them horses and exercises to practice in the various areas. Her tone was always gentle but I could tell from way the children and teenagers jumped to attention and didn’t offer any argument that Lielu wasn’t afraid to get stern should the occasion call for it.

Lielu might not be a warrior like her mother but within the direhorse pen walls she was clearly Citra’s daughter—unmovable, the one people looked to for guidance and clearly passionate about her craft.

Before the groups parted, Lielu held up a hand to stop conversation and suddenly returned her attention to me.

“This is Sara. She is new to riding, so I expect all of us to be helpful and offer guidance when needed. We all were beginners at one point, and therefore negative comments or jokes about her origins will not be tolerated. Am I understood?”  
  
The children nodded without hesitation, sending me toothy smiles when I looked in their direction. The teenagers, on the other hand, were much more reserved. I didn’t blame them; all of them had probably lost friends and family in the Battle of Pandora, and most likely saw me as a prolonging of that painful reminder. I didn’t smile at them, sensing that it wouldn’t be well received, but I did nod in greeting and make the touch to the forehead—an informal way to acknowledge a group of people or an individual with whom you were on good terms. Terul was the only one to return the gesture as the teenagers departed.

The children went to the older direhorses’ pen—Lielu quietly explained that the elderly horses were much more accustomed to a variety of different mind-melds and would be much more patient with the inevitable mistakes of small children. I watched in awe as the children, so tiny in comparison to the aging direhorses, fearlessly approached the animals and made _tsaheylu_. The direhorses immediately extended a leg to allow the children to clamber up onto their backs, clearly realizing the need once connected with the younger Na’vi minds.

“Come, Sara,” Lielu murmured, interrupting my gawking and leading me to a much younger direhorse that was standing somewhat away from the rest of the action. When I asked, Lielu informed me that the animal was only five years old, which confused me because how was a much younger animal going to be okay with a complete novice hopping on its back?

Following Lielu’s example with the other direhorses I whistled a few times as I approached, waiting until the direhorse’s ears flicked toward me before reaching out to touch the sturdy neck.

Lielu joined me at the direhorse’s side. “His name is Tìyo’.”

I raised a brow at the name. “You named him ‘perfection’?” I asked in English. 

Lielu nodded. “I raised him—the mother died after giving birth. Most thought he would not survive but he did, because he is _perfect_,” she crooned, leaning in to touch her forehead to the direhorse’s muzzle. The animal clearly recognized its surrogate mother if the pleased humming was anything to go by. Lielu laughed and hugged the direhorse around the neck. Tìyo’ wasted no time in curving his head and neck around the woman so that his large cheek was pressed against her shoulder blades. 

A sharp longing rose up in me at the sight. It was one I was familiar with; it came every time I saw the Na’vi interact with their banshees. The bond was different with a direhorse, not permanent but just as powerful—as Lielu’s relationship with Tìyo’ clearly demonstrated.

I craved that primal, unbreakable bond with a fierceness that surprised me. 

Lielu pulled back from the embrace and continued:

“Tìyo’ is my best teacher. He helps the children learn to use _tsaheylu _the right way; it only takes one lesson for the student to learn well enough to move on,” Lielu explained, giving the direhorse a loving pat on the shoulder and smiling at him as if sharing a private joke.

“I be slow learner, so I hope I no disappoint,” I joked in Na’vi. 

Lielu frowned and reached forward to grasp my upper arm. “Like I said; Tìyo’ only needs one lesson. No fear, Sara, and no shame. We are all students here.”

A few minutes later I was sitting on Tìyo’s back, adjusting my legs to find a better grip and thanking every deity in existence that my friends from Hell’s Gate weren’t here to witness my first riding lesson. I could only imagine the heckling Jake would give me, having gone through it personally and with a much less patient instructor, and the gentle but somehow just as embarrassing encouragement Norm would try to offer.

Yeah, no to _all _of that. 

“Make the bond,” Lielu urged, standing beside the direhorse and looking up at me while I nodded with a confidence that I most certainly didn’t feel. My fingers felt clumsy and useless as I reached back for my thick neural braid and gently maneuvered the direhorse’s protective sheath to allow our neural strands to mingle together.

I had studied _tsaheylu _for years, had written _papers _about it under Dr. Augustine’s careful eye and yet no amount of academic study could have prepared me for how it felt to experience the bond for myself. Even Jake’s video logs, which had gone into great detail about the sensation, hadn’t been enough.

My entire body shivered because I was suddenly in two places at once. One part of me was sitting and another was standing on six legs, air shuddering through our air holes in a comforting rhythm as we adjusted to the new presence in our minds.

Almost immediately, a nudge came from the foreign consciousness that steered our minds to their separate places once more. It was done in such a clear way that I knew that when I made _tsaheylu _again I would be able to make the separation myself.

In the next breath I was just Sara again, except that the bond equipped me with with an awareness that hadn’t been there before. I could feel Tìyo’s heartbeat so close to my thoughts that I almost felt the thudding of his much larger heart in my own chest. His legs tensed as he shifted his weight, unaware of his own dangerous strength in a way that astounded me.

In his mind, his strength was neither good nor bad but essential to survival and therefore not something to fear.

“No fear,” I whispered in Na’vi, and felt Tìyo’ respond, craning his head around to nuzzle at my bent knee. A wave of calm swept through me, definitely not my own, and my head cocked to the side when I realized that it was more than an animal’s soothing—it had a distinctly familiar feel to it.

Lielu’s hand on my leg made me open my eyes. I blinked rapidly to accustom myself to the strange sharpness that had overtaken my normal vision.

“Do you feel it? Do you see why Tìyo’ is the perfect teacher?” she asked softly, almost under her breath.

I sucked in a deep gulp of air, feeling an echo of the sensation of breathing through air holes that had been mine for the briefest of seconds.

“Your bond with him,” I breathed out in English, too distracted to remember to speak in Na’vi.

Lielu nodded proudly. “It is not tradition to bond with a _pa’li _before they turn two years old—usually, the bond at such a young age is reserved for their mothers and other _pa’li_, to allow them to learn _pa’li _herd behavior and such. I bonded with him the moment his mother died because if I hadn’t, he wouldn’t have tried to walk. The bond is made the moment the foal leaves the mother’s body and it is through that bond that the baby knows to begin trying to stand,” she explained, rubbing Tìyo’s nose with a tenderness that said more than her words.

“Bond like with banshee?” I asked, this time in Na’vi because I was finally composed enough to slip back into the language. Lielu nodded again, more curtly this time, a pain burning in her eyes that spoke of many people doubting the validity of that claim.

“I chose him as mine when he came into the world and he chose me as his—if he hadn’t, he would have rejected the first bond and died along with his mother.”

I felt it more clearly, now, the bond Lielu spoke of. It was something so subtle that I’m sure the children didn’t even notice it, so used to Lielu’s physical presence in the direhorse riding area that it didn’t feel unnatural to have the barest hint of it in their minds when they bonded with Tìyo’.

The next two hours were spent trying to perfect the art of directing a direhorse with just my thoughts. Much harder than it sounds, trust me. I didn’t realize just how quick and changeable my thoughts were until I tried to narrow down my mind to one single direction. Jake had mentioned that he had spoken aloud in the beginning to direct the horse but when I mentioned it to Lielu her ears flicked backwards in displeasure.

“Speaking the words aloud is a command separated from the bond, making the _pa’li _a steed and nothing more. The bond is in the mind, and that is where true communication is found.”

Tìyo’ was just as Lielu said: a _teacher_. When my thoughts weren’t clear enough, he would stop all movement and flick an ear in my direction, clearly scolding in a way that made me laugh. I learned quickly, though, always having been good at mental exercises and things that required intense mental concentration. After an hour and a half I got to the point where I could canter in large circles without feeling like I was going to fall off or give an incorrect suggestion, settling into a rhythm and even getting bold enough to weave in and out of the trees that surrounded the clearing. 

So intent was my focus that it took me a while to realize that a small group of spectators had gathered behind Lielu. 

My eyes immediately found Kinak among them; it was hard to miss his tall, broad-shouldered frame in a group of lanky teenagers and small children. I scowled at his presence, feeling as perplexed as Lielu looked as she spoke to her brother in hushed tones that didn’t carry across the field.

Tìyo’ felt my inner conflict and stomped a foot to get my attention. I leaned down to pat at his neck, trying my best to send an apology through the bond. He snorted, clearly impatient for us to return to our lesson.

Leaning down to rest my forehead against the arch of his neck felt so natural in that moment.

“Am I fooling myself by thinking I can do this?” I whispered to him in English.

The direhorse didn’t answer in words, obviously, but there was this odd jolt of energy that came from his end. It was akin to the bittersweet yet bolstering feeling that had filled me in my last moment with Dr. Augustine, when she pulled me into a fierce embrace before leaving with Jake, Norm and Trudy. It was the first and last time she hugged me, and when I closed my eyes I found myself in that drafty hallway once more, clinging to the woman I had grown to love so much and biting back the words I desperately wanted to say—_anything_to keep her there with me.

_“Give ‘em hell, ‘evi,_” _Dr. Augustine whispered into my ear before pulling away and striding towards the air hanger. Her hair whipped around her face as she turned to give us one last look. All I could do was stare as the woman I considered a second mother disappeared behind heavy metal doors. _

I gasped back into myself, touching my tear-streaked cheeks and feeling Tìyo’ there with me, the simple yet unshakable animal presence enough to keep me from falling apart completely. With a shake of my head I broke the neural connection as gently as my shaking hands were able and slid down from the horse’s back. Unwilling—or unable, perhaps—to break the connection so soon, I kept my hand on the animal’s neck, leaning into him as I composed myself.

“I’ll give them hell, Dr. Augustine. I promise,” I murmured into the silence, feeling the warm breath of Tìyo’ on my hip and the heat of the sun on my shoulders. A soft breeze blew through the field as I spoke, making the grass around my ankles shiver against my skin and the scent of the deeper forest reach us even in the midst of so many flowers. For some bizarre reason the smell made me cry even harder.

“Sara, are you alright?” Lielu asked gently from behind me, putting a hand on my shoulder. I nodded without breaking contact with Tìyo’ and the other Na’vi woman didn’t try to press further, simply standing there with me until the tears stopped.

We walked back to the group a short while later and I was shocked to see the children racing to meet us, braids bouncing as they ran forward to take my hands in their smaller ones.

Immediately the chattering began:

“You rode so well, Sara!”

“Your hands are funny—why do you have an extra finger?”

“I want to ride with Sara next—”

“No, I called first turn, you can wait—”

I looked past the little ones to see the group of teenagers watching stoically, some of them scowling but most of them with neutral expressions on their faces. Rini was the first to walk forward and raise her hands to calm the children, her eyes still wary but lacking the open hostility of before. 

“We can be proud of our newest Clan sister without scaring her off, can’t we?” she asked the children, to which they immediately nodded and stepped back a little bit, trying their best to contain themselves. I laughed a little and sent Rini a grateful look before kneeling down to speak to the smallest child, the one that had made such a fuss about my hands.

Raising my eyebrows at her, I lifted my hand and wiggled all five fingers. Her face split into a grin as she offered (and wiggled) her own in response. The other children took my getting down to their level as permission and crowded around to carefully touch the extra finger and compare their hands to mine, whispering amongst themselves as they investigated the strangeness of my eyebrows and less sharply defined facial features. 

“You all ride very good,” I commented in Na’vi, grimacing when an eager chorus of corrections came from the children.  
  
“_Well_! You all ride very _well_!” was the general consensus and I quickly corrected the statement, relaxing when they nodded in approval. Lielu scooped up the little girl who had asked about my hands and tossed her into the air, much to her delight, before giving her students another list of tasks to complete with their horses.

I stayed kneeling as the children ran off and waved back to those that paused to call out goodbyes. Lielu gave the girl in her arms a nose rub before sending her off to join her companions. At that point I had almost forgotten that Kinak was there, that is, until I stood and turned to face Lielu.

“You need something?” I asked, my irritation at his continued presence making the Na’vi words come without any fear of mistakes—the overthinking is what made me jumble up my words, I think.

He met my anger with anger of his own, his brow furrowing as he crossed his arms.

“I don’t answer to you, _dreamwalker_,” he snapped, the emphasis on the name making it clear he meant it as an insult. 

Lielu let out a groan, putting a hand over her face and leaning against Tìyo’.

“Kinak, please—”

I cut her off, stepping forward to get into Kinak’s space. She might not want a fight but I had no such hesitations on that front. The taller man moved back immediately, ears flicking backwards and nostrils flaring.

“_Sara_. My name _Sara_,” I gritted out through clenched teeth.

“I don’t plan on using it—that would suggest that I wish to form a connection,” Kinak hissed back.

I threw up my hands in exasperation. “But you _here_, watching me! If no want connection, stay _away_!”

The instinctual urge was to shove at his chest, and so I did, not sure why I wasn’t putting up a stronger resistance to letting my Na’vi instincts take over. I was a scientist at heart; logic and rationality is what I was valued for at Hell’s Gate. And yet here, in the wild of Pandora’s forests and in a body that still didn’t feel like mine, I wasn’t able to access the rational part of myself as easily.

Kinak puffed up, his fangs gleaming in the sunlight as he lifted his hands to shove back, much harder than I was expecting—it was a miracle that I managed to stay on my feet. 

“Don’t _touch _me,” was his cold command, the masculine deepness of his voice vibrating through the air between us.

I snorted. “Don’t _watch _me,” I retorted, calling him out because _someone _had to. For all that he was disdainful, anyone with half-decent eyesight could see that his gaze hadn’t left me since he arrived. His words said that he was indifferent but his eyes told a very different story.

I blinked despite my desire to win the staring contest because his face was starting to get hazy around the edges. Blinking helped, but only for a moment because in the next moment the blurriness returned. My knees were also getting wobbly—had the hours of riding tired me out more than I thought?

Kinak bared his teeth and for a second I thought he was going to push me again. Something he saw in my eyes stopped him, though, because his furious expression smoothed out to one of confusion instead.

“What—” I began, but as I tried to take a step back my legs turned to jelly under me and suddenly my entire body sagged forward.

Kinak’s grip on my shoulders was the only thing that kept me from falling face-first onto the ground. Lielu let out a sound of worry and rushed to my side, her golden eyes wide as she searched for the cause of my collapse. I blinked rapidly to clear the haze, panic settling in when nothing seemed to alleviate the sensation. I at least had enough self-awareness to push Kinak’s too-warm hands away. He let me, snatching his hands back with such haste that if I had to guess, it would be that my touch had reminded him who and what I was. 

“She’s never been in the dreamwalker body this long, has she?” Kinak asked his sister as she carefully helped me walk over to the entrance of the direhorse area—in some distant corner of my brain I was grateful that the children weren’t paying attention, and that the siblings were making sure they didn’t have any reason to find out.

“_She _here, _skxawng_, and can speak for own self,” I groaned in Na’vi as we reached the outside, frowning at the spots that swept across my vision when I was eased down to sit on a fallen log. Lielu stifled a laugh at my name-calling, ignoring her brother’s glare and busying herself with calling Tìyo’ to her side and jumping onto the animal’s back.

“I’m going to take that as a ‘no’,” Kinak muttered, and I couldn’t tell if my brain was inventing the sensation, but I could’ve sworn that I felt the same careful touch across the skin of my arm that I had the day we met.

Then again, I could also hear the opening notes of an ancient pop rock song (“Hey Jude”—Dad’s favorite Beatles song) and smell the faintest hint of Mom’s banana muffins cooking in the oven, so I wasn’t about to place bets on the validity of what my brain was telling me.

_Hey Jude, don’t be afraid. You were made to go out and get her…_

“The minute you let her under your skin, Then you begin to make it better…” I sang to myself, concentrating hard on the lyrics in a vain attempt to stay conscious. Kinak muttered something about crazy dreamwalkers under his breath and if I hadn’t been so focused on singing I would have laughed.

The heavy sound of hoof beats filled my ears, temporarily blocking out the sound of music.

Before I could attempt to ask where Lielu was going, before I could even try to open my eyes, everything slipped into darkness—not quite as abrupt as a forced shut-down of the Avatar mind-transfer but just as disconcerting.

It was as if something had snapped in my mind, like a rubber band stretched to the point where it had no other option but to snap in two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Na'vi Translations: 
> 
> 'ite: daughter  
Sa'nok: mother  
Sa'nu: mom (affectionate form of 'mother')  
Samuke: aunt (*I couldn't find this word in the dictionary, so I combined the words 'sa'nok'/mother and 'tsmuke'/sister)  
kaltxì: hello  
karyu: teacher  
pa'li: direhorse  
tsaheylu: bond (neural connection)  
'evi: kid (affectionate form of 'child')  
skxawng: idiot, moron


	7. Little Star

_Electronic Journal_

* * *

_Name: _Sara Mason

_Location: _Tipani Hometree

_Time/Date:_ 1837/November 22, 2154

* * *

_Entry 5_

_To keep a very long, tension-ridden story short, I met the warrior trainer Citra—also Lielu’s goddamn _mother_—and I managed to convince her to train me.  
  
(I threw a knife at her and scolded her son Kinak—who, get this, is not only my one Na’vi friend’s _brother _but also the young man that saved my _life_—and somehow it _worked…?_)_

_All that drama aside, the main reason I’m writing this entry is because I collapsed after spending the morning riding a direhorse. I can’t remember anything after sitting down on the log outside the direhorse pen, which is _horrifying _because Lielu says that I was still speaking to Kinak when she left to go get __the healers. _

_It was all very anticlimactic in the end. I woke up in the healer’s section of Hometree a few hours later feeling completely normal, and once I had convinced the healers of my physical wellness I immediately found my electronic journal and sent Max a message about what had happened—RDA had done one thing right, and that was install all the electronic journals with a signal strong enough to reach Hell’s Gate from anywhere on the planet. _

_Max responded within ten minutes with a steady stream of reassurances and a very long over-due explanation. _

_In summary: the abrupt shutting down of my mind, along with the loopy feeling of disorientation, was the final stage of the permanent mind-transfer that had never been studied due to the lack of test subjects. It was the formerly human mind’s way of solidifying into the new and yet same one—Max used a lot more fancy science words and processes that I won’t punish the reader by listing here. _

_Jake had gone through the same thing the day after his Ceremony and had, at Max’s request, undergone several full-body scans in the Avatar lab so as to better understand the process and make sure it wasn’t a permanent thing. Thankfully, it wasn’t—it was a one time thing, apparently. _

_(You had _days _to tell me all this, Jake, so you bet your ass that you’re on my shit list. Norm and I deserved to know about it before agreeing to make the transfer—I don’t know if I would have said yes if I had known beforehand that my brain might shut down without warning after all was said and done.) _

_The symptoms had been much less severe for Jake; he had some dizziness and an inability to form complete sentences but stayed conscious while the effects wore off. Max says that it was because Jake’s mind was much more accustomed to being in his Avatar for long periods of time before the Ceremony; the transfer was less traumatizing due to his mind’s familiarity with the enhanced Na’vi brain patterns. _

_Max theorizes that the final transfer step is triggered by tsaheylu, which would explain why Jake experienced it so soon after his Ceremony—he must have bonded with Rogue early the next morning. When I sent an irritated message demanding why Max hadn’t told me about it the moment he found out, he defended that the data had still been processing when Norm and I went through the Ceremony, and that he had wanted to be sure that it wasn’t just a Jake-isolated event before worrying us. Norm hadn’t had his little moment yet but Max is encouraging him to make the bond as soon as possible, to get it over with. _

_It says something very troubling about my priorities that the physical upheaval is second in line to what’s currently running circles around my head. _

_The thing that I can’t stop thinking about is the fact that Dr. Augustine _knew _Lielu and her family, long enough (and intimately enough) for Lielu to call her Sa’nu—the equivalent of ‘mom’ or ‘mommy’ in English. I asked Max to go through Dr. Augustine’s belongings in search of her history with the Tipani and he told me he’d tell me if anything came up. Having to rely on others to do research isn’t my favorite feeling, but in this case it’s my only option—I can’t exactly waltz into the Hell’s Gate barracks anymore, can I? _

_Citra came by a few minutes ago to inform me that she still expected me to begin training with her at dawn, so there’s _that_. I honestly can’t tell if I like her or hate her and that in of itself is enough to make me smile—I felt the same about Dr. Augustine when I first started working in the Avatar Program all those years ago. _

_It’s a day of duality, apparently, because the same hate-intrigue comes to mind when I think of Kinak. I’ve seen two sides of him now—the stoic but gentle person that didn’t hesitate to help me when he saw that I was hurt and the hardened, bitter young man with an open dislike of Avatars and the human scientists that drove them. The worst part is that both sides feel completely genuine. I’m honestly afraid that I’ll get emotional whiplash if I try to get on better terms with him—my life is crazy _enough_at the moment without having to tip toe around Kinak, too. _

_For now, I’m going to focus on training as hard as I can and that’s it. _

_It’s all I _can _do. _

_End of Entry 5_

* * *

The next two weeks flew by in a blur, my days quickly taking on a predictable rhythm.

The early morning hours I spent with Citra and the other prospective hunters, learning how to use a bow and arrow as well as sparring to increase my agility and endurance. 

Citra broke the news to me that first morning—the Iknimaya (the Tipani called it _Txampfya_) would take place in two months. The Tipani only held Txampfya once a year, unlike the Omaticaya that had Iknimaya once every two months, and so if I wanted to prove myself I would have to be ready by then.

Kinak was present during the morning training sessions but made a point to stay as far away as possible. I wasn’t bothered at all by his avoidance—it left me free to concentrate on my lessons—but his presence at the training sessions _did_make me consider our first meeting with a fresh perspective. A few days in I bucked up the courage to ask Citra why Kinak had been allowed to answer Toruk Makto’s call if he wasn’t a warrior yet. Her curt answer was that Kinak had been sent to defend the Tree of Souls, along with many soon-to-be hunters of the other Clans.

I spent the afternoons with Lielu, who not only helped me with direhorse riding but also with the Na’vi language. Every day I got more and more comfortable speaking Na’vi, largely thanks to the small children I worked with in the direhorse area. Lielu’s youngest students were honest-to-God sweethearts and never hesitated to correct me while at the same time being patient enough to let me stumble through seemingly simple concepts. The teenagers were slowly warming to me, though I suspected that their tentative interactions were due more to their respect for Lielu than any true desire to befriend me. I wasn’t about to complain—I’d take what I could get.

The rest of the Clan still avoided me for the most part, but the whispers about my strange, ugly face and my weird hands slowly dissipated—probably because the people got bored and soon found other things to gossip about.

The comments about my appearance stung more than I would ever admit. My looks were something that no amount of training or learning of Na’vi culture could change. I was working my _literal _tail off trying to learn the Tipani ways and yet when I looked around I felt like I wasn’t making any headway at all. 

Sänume got me for the evenings—that is, when she wasn’t busy with Clan matters, which she often was. When she was free, the woman sat me down for about an hour and showed me the more basic every-day skills of the Na’vi that life at Hell’s Gate hadn’t prepared me for: skinning and preparing animals brought in by the hunters, simple basket and mat weaving, how to differentiate the different occupations of the Tipani based on what ornaments they wore on their arms and hair…and much, much more.

At first it was just Sänume and I but by the second week more began to join us; some of the mothers of the children I worked with in the direhorse pen, to start, and by the end of the two weeks a few men had joined as well. They were silent and watchful at first but when it was proven I could communicate perfectly well in Na’vi they began to offer tips and tricks to make things easier.

Those nights were my favorite—sure, the others wouldn’t be there if their Clan Leader wasn’t, but I tried not to think about that too much because for an hour or so, I could forget that I was an alien among them and just _be_, laughing at the jokes some of the younger mothers made and hiding smiles at the silly gossip they traded around the circle as they worked. It was like getting a glimpse into what life could have been if I had been born Na’vi.

* * *

I walked to the training field before the sun had risen, fiddling every now and then with the knife sheath and belt looped around my waist. It had taken a few days of careful stitching to make them but the end result was worth it. Lielu had even taken the time to help me sew on some pretty blue and green beads. It was my first adornment, and even though I had made it myself (as a whole, gifted adornments were more valuable) I was ridiculously proud of it.

Dawn was just breaking when I walked past the last few trees and into the training field. Citra was already there of course, along with the small group of Txampfya hopefuls. There were six of us total: Kinak and myself, a small, fierce woman named Ninoa, a cheerful young man named Akwei, and two equally quiet sisters named Teril and Sana. I usually sparred with Akwei, as he had been the first to initiate contact with me beyond basic politeness, but occasionally one of the sisters would volunteer. Kinak and Ninoa _always _partnered together and _always _ignored me (and their peers, when the peers in question interacted with me). It bothered me at first but I soon came around to the idea that their loss was my gain—interacting with them would leave me with nothing but a headache, so in reality they were doing me a favor by steering clear. 

Teril noticed me first—she was the older of the two sisters and beautiful in a distant, cold sort of way.

“Hello, Sara,” she greeted, making the forehead-touch, which I returned with a quietly murmured ‘I see you’. Her large eyes immediately went to my new knife sheath. “I look forward to knocking that knife out of your hands when we spar,” she declared, her tone as calm and casual as if she were commenting on the weather. I laughed, having gotten used to her dry sense of humor fairly early on.

“Lucky for me that I enjoy cleaning my weapons,” I joked back. Teril’s expression didn’t change but I saw the spark of amusement in her eyes that even _she _couldn’t quite hide.

Citra cleared her throat to get our attention. Once we were quiet, she began:

“Teril and Akwei; you will practice with the _meresh'ti cau'pla _until both of you can do it perfectly.” 

Teril’s teeth showed as she let out an almost silent hiss—it was no secret that Teril didn’t like Akwei’s overly cheerful demeanor. Akwei’s ears flicked in a moment of uncustomary annoyance but he hid his emotions well.  
  
Citra went on as if she didn’t see her students’ reactions. “Sana and Ninoa; you will join Lielu in the direhorse pens today and practicing shooting while riding.”

Ninoa and Sana weren’t nearly as composed as the previous two had been. Sana let out a cry of protest, her ears pinning back in displeasure—she was much less quick to learn than her sister and had a tendency to make light of everything, which meshed with Ninoa’s no-nonsense attitude about as well as water did with oil.

Ninoa’s eyes narrowed. “Teacher, I—”

“It was not a request,” Citra interrupted with an imperious wave of her hand. “Now _go_.”

I determinedly didn’t look over at Kinak, who I assumed was doing the same, and kept my expression neutral even though I was just as angry and bewildered as the rest of them. It had been proven early on that Teril and I worked well together, Akwei and Sana were two peas in a pod and Kinak and Ninoa were perfectly happy brooding in their own private corner—why was Citra so purposefully ruining the dynamic?

It was only once the other four moved to begin their tasks and were out of earshot that Citra turned to face Kinak and myself. Her eyes moved between the two of us, lingering on her son before she spoke:

“You will track and observe predators today.”

Kinak nodded; his irritation at his mother’s division of the group evident in the visible clenching of his jaw. I for one couldn’t leave it at that, not when Citra of all people knew just how much Kinak disliked me.

“Is this a test?” I asked, gesturing between Kinak and myself when Citra furrowed her brow in a silent request for clarification.

The older woman crossed her arms over her chest. “To succeed as a warrior, one must trust their brothers and sisters to stand with them. To trust them, one must _know _them. If you cannot do this—” Citra paused to give a significant look to her scowling son. “—then it would be best to abandon this path all together.” 

She walked away after that, as if able to read my mind and know that I was gearing up to protest. I was left taking deep breaths in a desperate attempt to not scream while Kinak stood silent behind me. After a moment or two of being a coward I finally lifted my chin and turned to look him in the eye for the first time in two weeks.  
  
Kinak’s jaw tensed again as his gaze met mine. I stared him down, waiting for some sort of reaction from him, but of course he stayed nice and quiet. Rolling my eyes, I turned to head towards the forest, leaning down to grab a bow and quiver from the wooden rack set up under one of the smaller trees. Traditionally, hunters had to pass the Txampfya before making their own bow, and so to accommodate for that there were bows available for training hunters to borrow during training.

I waited for Kinak to follow suit before carefully striding into the forest, focusing on keeping my steps as silent as possible.

To my credit I managed to ignore Kinak for the first hour, placing all my attention on finding signs of animal activity. Everything was fine and dandy and _silent _until I accidentally followed the trail of a small herbivore rather than the viperwolf I had assumed the tracks belonged to. I hissed in frustration and let out a quiet but steady stream of Na’vi curses—courtesy of Lielu’s teenage students, who delighted in teaching me the less common swears when their teacher wasn’t nearby.

“Your Na’vi is improving.”

My ears perked up at that, reflecting my surprise to hear his voice after several weeks of pointed silence. I turned to look at him only to find him steadily staring into the undergrowth. The muscle in his jaw was tensing up again—I was beginning to recognize it as a sign of stress, not just anger.

Just to jab at him, I decided to answer in English.  
  
“Yeah, thanks for the help—oh _wait_…”

Kinak sent me a flat stare before crouching down to touch at a broken branch to our right. He sniffed at it for a moment before confidently heading in that direction. I contemplated finding my own way but knew Citra would make me eat my own tail if I went against her orders like that.

So I followed, continuing in English as I went. 

“What, you expect me to just pretend like the last two weeks never happened? I’m sorry, but when you hold a knife to someone’s throat, then make wild generalizations about what they’re capable of and _then _treat them like a diseased animal for the next two weeks…you can’t expect that person to play nice,” I ranted, reveling in letting myself speak my native language after several weeks of only speaking in Na’vi. It felt like stepping back into a pair of old but still beloved shoes—perfectly molded to my feet even though they were falling apart. 

Kinak didn’t answer. Just as I was opening my mouth to really let him have it, though, he stopped so suddenly that I almost ran into him.

My heart very nearly leapt into my throat when the familiar sounds of English, albeit heavily accented and imperfect, left his mouth. 

“It is…_hard_…to feel two sides. Your kind made so insane by tests that they no want to just _live_, and that I cannot ignore. But you…you treat my sister as _equal _when many do not, and I cannot ignore _that_. I no speak because I have no words—just like now.”

He turned to face me once he had finished—I suspect that he waited to do so in order to escape the embarrassment of speaking while looking in my eyes. I was still so surprised that my brain was taking a page out of Kinak’s book by not having the words.

Kinak’s eyes were a slightly darker shade of gold than the eyes of his mother and sister—who for all their personality differences looked almost identical. His face was, for once, not bereft of emotion but instead possessed a complexity of feelings that reflected his words.

Guilt mixed with pride, anger with sadness, and curiosity quickly masked by indifference.

I felt this _bizarre _urge to reach out and touch his arm, as if to steady him, and hastily smashed that urge into pieces because it had to be the Na’vi instincts, right?

Clenching my fingers into fists to avoid following through with the impulse, I swallowed hard.

“I thought you hated all humans, but no…you hate _scientists_—you hate people like Dr. Augustine,” I said in Na’vi, staring him in the eye so as to not miss the reaction to my words. His jaw clenched and his eyes hardened in a way that gave me my answer.

I let out a heavy sigh, tucking a few stray braids behind my ears and flinching when my fingers accidentally brushed against the sensitive tips.

“There’s nothing I can do to change your mind about me, is there?” I asked, knowing better than to look in his eyes and see the ‘no’ there. A hot pressure welled up in my throat and it took all of my strength of will to shove it away and pretend it wasn’t there.

Being a scientist was part of who I was—if the issue lay there, in the core of what made me _Sara, _any chance of friendship between us was already dead. I was never going to _not _be Dr. Augustine’s student, never _not _going to view the world around me with both an appreciation for the beauty as well as an appreciation for the delicate biological processes that studying xenobotany had unveiled for me and for so many others. 

A moment later, as Kinak was opening his mouth to answer, a horrible smell reached us. I let out an involuntary gasp as the scent of predator blood and open flesh and _agony _filled my nostrils and from the way Kinak’s ears flicked backwards I knew he could smell it too. My Na’vi senses were screaming at me to run but like I said: I was a scientist. Stronger than my human (or Na’vi, now) instincts was the need to _know_.

And so I ran, but not in the direction of the training field as a sane person would have, but in the direction of the smell. I heard Kinak’s shout of protest behind me but staunchly ignored it as I went. My heart hammered in my chest as I ducked under low growing palms and avoided the sticky leaves of a carnivorous plant, every step taking me deeper and deeper into the jungle where the stench even more powerfully permeated the air.

I jumped atop a halfway fallen tree blocking my path and shimmied up it, using the sticky moss as traction and as a way to soften the sounds of my ascent. I glanced down through the leaves of the tree and caught a glimpse of something black and glossy. My brow furrowed and without thinking I swung myself off the tree and to the forest floor, unable to resist a smile of pride when my landing barely made a sound.

When I looked up my blood ran cold and a small cry escaped my lips because a fucking _thanator _was lying there, gasping for air and snarling at me even while bright red blood gushed out of the huge gouges on its chest and back. It didn’t look like a regular thanator, though, with strange blotches of purple marking its legs and back. I backed up several steps only to bump into something solid, which made me shriek all over again because what if whatever had injured the thanator had come back? 

Kinak’s hands grasped my upper arms in an iron grip and in one motion he had pushed me behind himself even though he looked as terrified as I felt when I caught a glimpse of his face.

“_Palulukan_,” he breathed, a mixture of fearful and reverent.

The creature let out an agonized yowl and tried to get up, eyes locked on us like red-amber lasers, but the wounds hindered its movement so much that it had no option but to fall back again. The movement drew my attention to the overly large belly, the lower half of the creature’s muscles clenching almost involuntarily before letting up for a bit and all of a sudden I _knew. _

“She’s in labor,” I choked out in English, and Kinak’s tail flicked in confusion.

“What is that?” he whispered back in Na’vi, to which I let out a slightly hysterical giggle because of _course _he wouldn’t know that goddamn word, of _course_.

“Currently trying to push a baby _out _of her,” I shot back, my voice much shriller than I would have hoped but I was too focused on keeping an eye on the thanator to care. Kinak’s eyes widened in horror but he quickly reined it in, eyes narrowing as he considered the scene before us.

“We should leave,” he said after thinking about it for almost ten seconds. I knew because I had been counting, using the careful calculation as a way to keep me from completely losing it.

“What?” I blurted out in Na’vi. “But what about baby?”

Kinak looked back at me, puzzled. “The cub will die, as it should.”

“But we’re _here_—”

Dark golden eyes flashed. “Only because _you _couldn’t let things rest! Some things are set by the will of Eywa—this is one of them." 

“If Eywa controls all, why did she lead me here?” I shot back. 

Kinak’s mouth opened but no sound came out. After a second of catching flies he snapped his mouth shut so forcefully that I heard teeth click together.

I looked back to the thanator, watching as she gave up trying to run, panting and groaning as her body struggled to stay alive long enough to deliver the cub inside of her. 

Mind racing, I dared to take a step closer and crouched down so I could get a glimpse of the claw marks partially hidden by the thanator’s spines. Kinak kept a hold on my wrist, though, tugging me back and scowling down at me.

“We need to _leave_—” he began, but I quickly wrenched my wrist out of his grip and glared up at him.

“She was attacked by _another thanator_—that’s not normal predator behavior, especially where the females of a species are concerned,” I explained in English, too entrenched in my own theories to consider trying to translate to Na’vi. “We did a study on thanators back at Hell’s Gate a few years ago; we even managed to place trackers on a male and a female. The study showed, after two years of careful observation and tracking of territories, that thanators rarely fight with each other. If they do, its almost _always _males against males during the choosing of mates. It’s not normal for females to be attacked like this—_unless _they don’t fit the mold of what’s acceptable for their species. Look at her coloring,” I exclaimed, pointing to the purple splotches. “It clearly wasn’t an issue for one particular male, since he got her pregnant, but it’s entirely possible that another thanator saw her and instinctually tried to eliminate the oddity.”

Kinak’s mouth turned downward as he let out a frustrated hiss. 

“Why does it matter why she was attacked?” he asked, and I raised my eyebrows at him.

“So you understood all _that _but not the word ‘_labor_’?”

Kinak’s cheeks colored ever so slightly but he met my gaze unflinchingly. “I learned English by listening to Grace—‘labor’ wasn’t a word used often.”

Okay, I had to give him that one; Dr. Augustine was the _last _person I could imagine explaining birthing processes to a young Na’vi.

The thanator let out a pained whine that caught both of our attentions; I jumped at the sound and my hands immediately went to my knife. The feel of all five fingers grasping the knife handle made me pause, made me release my hold and lift my hand to better examine my fingers. They looked so _odd _after being around four-fingered Na’vi without any exposure to humans and for a moment I saw them as the rest of the Tipani saw them—strange and unnatural. 

My attention was diverted when the enormous creature before us let out a strangled howl. With a gush of blood, a small black body began to emerge from the vaginal canal. The sunlight hit the mother’s back, making the purple skin even more evident and my choice even clearer. 

_“I chose him as mine when he came into the world and he chose me as his—if he hadn’t, he would have rejected the first bond and died along with his mother.”_

“The will of Eywa,” I whispered before moving to unhook my bow from across my chest, fingers shaking as I slid an arrow from the quiver. The sturdy wooden shaft felt like ice against my fingertips and I struggled to place it correctly on the bowstring, sucking in a deep breath and keeping my eyes on my target like Citra had taught me. The arrow wouldn’t stay still, though, slipping out of my grip. I was too focused on the unmoving baby thanator lying in the grass by its mothers’ back legs, still in the amniotic sac and unattended to by the mother who seemed to have no energy left. Her amber eyes met mine, unblinking and horribly aware, and I felt my resolve slip.

Just when I was going to lower my weapon, a much larger, calloused hand guided mine into the right position; his upper body practically molded to my back as I successfully pulled the string back. His hands slowly lowered as I let out a slow breath and released my hold.

The arrow hit its mark—piercing the thick black hide of the animal right where her heart was. The mother’s death was quick, no longer than three seconds, but each second felt like an eternity. I watched the light fade from those fiery eyes and pretended I wasn’t shaking when the mighty head went limp.

I looked to the baby, then, and my horror shifted into worry as I hurried to where it lay. Kinak must have seen where my focus was, must have known what my plan was, but instead of stopping me like I expected he went to the side of the adult thanator, kneeling by her shoulder and bowing his head. As I turned my attention back to the cub, I heard him beginning a prayer:

“_Oeru txoa livu, ma oeyä tsmuke—” _

With my knife I carefully cut the slippery amniotic sac away, rubbing at the thanator’s skin to try and imitate a mother’s tongue. I had no idea what the fuck I was doing but I had to _try_. The idea of letting the baby die at its mother’s side, unknowing of the outside world and unknowing of its own existence, made my stomach clench with nausea.

A trickle of icy dread slid down my spine when the baby didn’t attempt to move under my administrations, even though I could see the little body shudder as it took surprisingly quiet first breaths. Were Pandoran births naturally quieter so that the mothers and babies didn’t attract unwelcome company?

“Come on, come on,” I urged as I reached for my queue braid, pausing when the baby’s lack of reaction caused hot wetness to fill my eyes. Was I too late?

I heard Kinak walk towards me and felt the steady wave of body heat when he crouched down beside me. I didn’t look at him, focusing on taking deep breaths to keep the tears at bay.

“My people will likely kill the cub on sight. If you make the bond, its death will create a void within you, a void that will always cause great pain.”

I tilted my head to look at him, surprised once again when I saw a softening around his eyes instead of the angry determination I was expecting. It was a sobering thing to realize that for all of my assumed understanding, I really didn’t know Kinak at all.

“I don’t care,” I stubbornly replied. “It deserves to live, deserves a chance to prove that it can be more than where it came from.”

Understanding sparked in Kinak’s eyes—I wasn’t just talking about the thanator cub and we both knew it. His strong brow furrowed as he ducked his head and muttered something so softly that I couldn’t make any sense of it. When he looked up I saw a grudging acceptance in his gaze.

It was all I needed; I turned back to the baby and gently felt around for the neural sheaths, letting out a triumphant sound when I found the one closest to me. I carefully slid the end of my braid alongside it and watched as the thanator’s pale neural strands mingled with mine.

It was so utterly _different _than bonding with a direhorse; different in the way hot was to cold, different on such a large scale that it took the breath out of my body with a painful _jolt_. The thanator’s distinctly female mind, even fresh out of the womb, was sharper than I was expecting and rattled at the walls of my consciousness, threatening to dominate me almost immediately. I gritted my teeth, struggling to adjust to the feeling of having six limbs and a burning hunger for fresh meat as I mimicked Tìyo’s technique of separating minds. Confusion flared from the female thanator’s mind at the touch of my thoughts against hers—she knew I wasn’t the same as she was, feeling instincts that were utterly foreign and therefore suspicious—and for an awful moment I could feel the potential of the small creature refusing the connection, slipping into the darkness beyond my reach and leaving a jagged hole behind.

But then, _then_, the wonderful warmth of acceptance filled every inch of my mind and I felt tears sliding down my cheeks as I opened my eyes to stare down at the thanator cub—my view of the jungle was tinged with shadow, as the cub’s eyes weren’t open yet and thus could only see darkness. The small body suddenly jerked into life as if hit with an electric shock, her many legs flailing as she struggled to move closer to me. I let out a watery laugh and reached forward without any fear of her already-sharp claws, cradling her and shaking with relief when the baby relaxed at my touch.

“It’s nice to meet you,” I rasped out, unable to stop smiling as I gently stroked the baby’s face. I felt Kinak watching me, felt his gaze lingering on my hands as they touched the tiny thanator’s still soft quills—they would harden in a few weeks or so according to Dr. Augustine’s Pandoran fauna guide. I’d have to re-read the chapter on thanators when I got back to Hometree.

The baby let out a soft whimper and nuzzled into my palm, snuffling around in search of food.

Kinak appeared before me, head cocked as he watched the thanator cub snuggle against my abdomen. His expression was as smooth as ever; revealing nothing of his thoughts in a way that I envied as much as I resented it.

“It is done,” he murmured.

I nodded. “It is.”

“What does it feel like?” he asked in a rush, and when I glanced over in surprise it was to see him staring at where the thanator’s neural strands were joined with mine with a depth of longing that shocked me—it was so different from his usual stoicism.

“It…” I began, but trailed off when the Na’vi words escaped me. Looking at the baby animal in my arms helped center me again enough to continue, speaking slowly to avoid making mistakes. “It feels like a _choice_—I chose her, from the moment I knew she was going to be born, and she chose me even though I’m not her kind. It feels like she’s always been here, inside, but now I finally see her with my own two eyes.”

Kinak listened with unusual focus, and when I finished he reached out, very slowly, to trace the line of a still-fragile quill with a single finger. The thanator squirmed, turning her head in the direction of the strange sensation with the intention of biting. 

Sucking in a sharp breath, I stopped the urge to bite in its tracks, soothing the confusion with pulses of calm and safety. I only relaxed once I felt the solidification of Kinak’s scent in her mind as someone her mother approved of; the thanator licked his hand instead of biting before turning back to me. The intelligence already present in the thanator’s young mind floored me; training her would be much more of a challenge than training Tìyo’ had been for Lielu.

A few minutes later, I found myself walking back to Hometree, Kinak close at my side and on high alert for any predators drawn in by the scent of a freshly birthed thanator cub. We passed under a tree, which sent us into deep shadow save for tiny specks of blinding white light peeking through the branches, the brightness of which stood out against the young thanator’s ink-black coloring—not a bit of purple in sight, therefore eliminating the risk of the cub sharing her mother’s fate.

_Almost like stars_, I mused. 

The thought at the forefront of my mind, I lifted her to my face so I could rub my nose against hers. The bond that was still firmly in place let the baby know that it was a touch born of affection, something she wouldn’t have seen much of with her natural mother—thanator mothers were notoriously tough on their young to better prepare them for the difficult life of a Pandoran predator—and so it only took a moment for her to mimic my movements.

The image of tiny dots of light against the darkness of the cub’s skin determinedly stuck around even as we rounded the corner of a large tree and found ourselves outside of Hometree, various Tipani clan members milling around the entrance, blissfully ignorant—for the moment, at least. 

I hefted the tiny creature more securely in my arms, sending a steady stream of comfort to her even as nervousness and fear twisted inside of my chest. Kinak stepped close enough for our shoulders to brush, and even if it was unintentional on his part, the touch gave me the courage I needed to straighten my back and smile down at the tiny thanator in my arms.

“Welcome home, Tanhì.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Na'vi Translations: 
> 
> meresh'ti cau'pla: a device used to wrap around the banshee's mouth and prevent it from biting the hunter while he/she attempts to make the bond (tsaheylu)
> 
> Iknimaya: rite of passage for hunters of the Omaticaya Clan
> 
> Txampfya: rite of passage for hunters of Tipani Clan (*had to invent this word, took the words "ocean" and "path" and combined them, seeing as the Tipani test happens in an ocean cave of sorts.)
> 
> palulukan: thanator
> 
> Oeru txoa livu, ma oeyä tsmuke: Forgive me, my sister...
> 
> tanhì: star


	8. Home

Instead of giving myself time to think (and run away screaming as a result) I walked right into Hometree and toward the heavy slab of stone that hosted Sänume and her small group of advisors—they made themselves available there every afternoon to address smaller, more public concerns. I wasn’t sure who was more surprised at my daring, Kinak or myself, but I didn’t stop to consider it as I marched forward. I felt more than saw Kinak at my side, his tail lashing back and forth in distress at the gasps and screams of the surrounding Tipani when they saw what was in my arms.

Tanhì whined and squirmed, unsure of why there was so much noise and eager to escape the tension that vibrated up and down her quills. I had to shake my shoulders as I walked in order to rid myself of the feeling of having hypersensitive spines, so strong was Tanhì’s projection of her discomfort.

It must have been a truly shocking sight because not one person attempted to stand in my way as I reached the stage-like structure. Sänume had risen to her feet by then and watched me approach.

“I will not insult either of our intelligences by even attempting to assume that you don’t know what it is you hold, Sara,” she said, her eyes sharp with barely concealed anger.

Her voice was soft but the silence in Hometree was so great that it was clearly heard by all. I flinched at the evenness of her tone—I almost would have preferred yelling—and took a deep breath before lifting my eyes to meet her gaze.

“I know what I hold, _Olo’eyktan_,” I replied in Na’vi.

Murmurs and whispers rippled through the gathered Tipani at my use of Sänume’s formal title. I hoped that it would resonate in the way I intended—using her title to show Sänume and her people that I respected her status as Clan Leader and wasn’t going to hide behind the fact that Sänume had publicly taken me under her wing.

Sänume’s mouth shifted into a frown. “Then why have you brought _evil _into our home?”

People around me were nodding in agreement; exchanging knowing looks with each other as they whispered amongst themselves. I looked back at Kinak and found him whispering frantically with his sister, who had shoved her way to the front the moment the crowd formed. I tried my best to push down the feelings of doubt and tightened my hold on the cub in my arms as I said:

“Eywa creates all life—you say that Eywa makes evil?”

I heard Kinak suck in a sharp breath at my loaded question— he couldn’t see it, but my legs were trembling in the face of speaking so boldly in front of the entire Clan. The nerves made my language mistakes more noticeable but I didn’t think anyone was paying attention to that—they were too busy staring at Sänume in anxious anticipation for her response.

Sänume hissed at my blatant accusation and stepped forward. Without thinking I angled my body slightly to the right so that she’d have to get through me if she wanted to get to Tanhì. The Clan Leader immediately recognized the movement for what it was and she seemed about to speak when her eyes flicked downwards and suddenly her ears pinned back in horror. When I followed the line of her gaze I found that it was locked on the spot where the end of mybraid and the neural strands of the thanator cub were connected.

“_Tsaheylu_,” the Tipani Clan Leader breathed. The word was softly spoken but again, the silence was such that it traveled through the crowd like wildfire. Accusations began, then, the noise rising to intense levels, but even with all that one voice managed to raise above all the rest: 

“Only a _demon _could ever bond with a _palulukan_—it would be safer to kill them both and be done with it!”

My ears folded back against my head, as if to block out the sound, but to no avail. Sänume’s tail almost hit my face as she yelled for silence—she must have heard it, too. I heard Kinak mutter something under his breath but when I looked at him his eyes were pinned on something in the crowd. Lielu snarled at the crowd standing too close to me, stepping in front of me and pulling out her knife with a swiftness that surprised me—her gentle smiles and easy laughter made it so easy to forget how deadly she was in close combat. I had seen her and Kinak practicing one day and _damn _but that girl was terrifying. It made me wonder, as did more and more often these days, why she had never gone through Txampfya.

Hurt stabbed through me at the person’s cruel suggestion but so did _anger_. Without thinking, I broke the bond with Tanhì, not wanting the baby to feel the full effects of my pain through _tsaheylu_, but kept her in my arms as I stepped up to the ledge and turned to face the crowd.

“In the human world—” I began in stilted Na’vi. “—there is old, old saying: ‘There is no good or bad, but thinking makes it so.’ Toruk Makto be dreamwalker, just like me, and he showed that Sky People can learn to see, can be One of the People. During Battle, Neytiri of the Omaticaya make _tsaheylu _with a _palulukan _much older and more dangerous than the one I hold. Is _she _demon?”

Tanhì tucked her head into the crook of my elbow, tail curling under my arm as she struggled to hide. Even without the bond I could feel the fear trembling under her skin and stroked a hand gently over her head in an attempt to soothe her. At the gesture, Tanhì lifted her head and whimpered, extending one of her neural sheaths to me in clear desire for comfort. Without hesitation I made _tsaheylu _in front of the entire Clan, feeling a sense of smug accomplishment at the cries of shock that erupted when I did so.

My voice shook when I spoke, my body still adjusting to the rawness of the bond:

“Just as Sky People can learn, so can this _palulukan_. She deserves to _live_—because if Eywa wanted her to die, I no would have been led to find her. _Pa’li _are trained from young years to accept Na’vi touch and later accept _tsaheylu_, and it is not seen as strange. Na’vi are taught to not point weapons at each other from very young years and to treat each other as Clan—why can’t _palulukan _do same?”

Silence met my speech, silence that filled me with dread because the Na’vi were a very vocal people and the lack of audible acknowledgement made me nervous.

Sänume was the first to move, turning to face me and fixing me with an intensely probing look.

“And if the _palulukan _cannot learn? What then, Sara? Have you considered that regardless of training it might wish to hunt prey that is readily available?” she asked, sweeping her hand to indicate the gathered Clan.

I swallowed hard and looked down at Tanhì. That was a mistake because the moment I did, the words died in my throat. Her hunger for meat was strong; stronger than it had been in the forest, and for an instant all I could think about was what I would do if she decided that what I gave her for food wasn’t enough. What _could _I do?

“I…” I attempted, but my throat closed in a rush of unexpected emotion. The touch of a calloused hand on my shoulder chased the rising anxiety away. I looked up, expecting to see Lielu, but almost jumped out of my skin to find that it was Citra standing by my side. The warrior trainer’s expression was neutral, as unaffected by the thanator cub’s presence in my arms as she had been whenever I accidentally cut myself trying to correctly tie arrowheads to the wooden shafts.

“I will monitor the _palulukan’s _training. If it fails and the Clan is in danger…” She paused to make eye contact with me as if to make sure I was listening, which seemed odd because I didn’t think I had ever listened so intently in my life. “I will kill the _palulukan _myself.”

Instinct drove me to hold the cub in my arms tighter and to my surprise Citra’s expression softened—from nostalgia, maybe?

Without warning, the woman reached out and placed a hand on Tanhì’s back, almost in challenge, and this time the cub didn’t so much as flinch. I felt my heart soar a bit when I realized that she was _learning_, learning that the scent of Na’vi meant friend instead of potential food. The cub must have felt my approval through the bond because she crooned in clear satisfaction.

The Tipani seemed to calm slightly at the sight of Citra so casually touching the thanator in my arms.

Sänume let out a sigh. “You’re far too good at manipulation,” she muttered, so low that only those of us closest to her could hear it.

“I learned from the best,” Citra declared with a significant look in the Clan Leader’s direction. Sänume rolled her eyes but sent her sister a fond flick of her tail as she stepped forward to address the entire Clan.

“These times are full of change, my brothers and sisters, and for the Tipani to stay strong we must change along with them. Let Sara raise the _palulukan_without interference—that is a command from your _Olo’eyktan_. Now go, and finish the evening in peace.”

* * *

Several more weeks flew by in a haze of training, eating, more training and sometimes sleeping. It got to the point where I finally caved to Max’s unsubtle hints—if I didn’t have time to write, maybe I could provide visual documentation?—and decided to record a video log out in the direhorse training area. I was usually way too self-conscious to do that—the video stuff was Jake’s thing and I was much better with written words anyway—but hey, desperate times called for desperate measures.

I glanced over to check on Tanhì one more time—she was busy gnawing on a piece of meat Lielu had given her to keep her occupied—before setting the journal to video mode. I typed in all the normal details in the small info box—

Electronic Journal (video mode)

_Name: _Sara Mason

_Location: _Tipani Hometree

_Time/Date:_ 1143/December 25, 2154

—and clicked the bright red record button.

The camera hummed to life and in an instant my face appeared on the screen as well as the trees behind me. Unsure of how to begin, I waved at the small camera built into the top of the journal screen.

“Hey, guys,” I began. Speaking English feeling distinctly odd and comforting at the same time. “Sorry that it’s been a while, I’ve been a bit…_busy_,” I explained, adjusting the laptop so that it showed more of my full body and not just from my chin upwards. Once I had done so, there was a moment of awkward silence that seemed to swallow me whole and I looked over at Tanhì again just to escape it.

How had Jake managed to make this look so _easy_? Writing down my thoughts was so much better, even if it meant I took longer to piece the entries together, because it didn’t involve the awkwardness of having to say all the stuff out loud.

“Jake’s way better at this than I am, so I apologize in advance for the awkwardness,” I joked, tucking a few stray braids behind my ears. My fingers brushed against the beads Teril had given me just last week. In a burst of inspiration I held one up to show the camera. 

“I finally got a gifted adornment—these are from a woman named Teril, who I train with. If you look closely you can see the tiny thanator heads carved on them. That’s because—”

A black blur was the only warning I got before Tanhì flew into my arms, sending me sprawling backwards. I couldn’t help but laugh as I struggled to sit back up—what can I say, she’s _cute_.

“Yeah, because of _this_,” I explained, unconsciously reaching for my neural braid and offering it to the three-week-old thanator. She had grown a lot in the past three weeks; her back now reached my knees and her claws were getting sharper every day. Her eyes had opened after the first few days and I fell even more in love when they did—they were a rich reddish-amber color.

Tanhì let out a growl-purr as she met the offered braid with her own neural sheath. In an instant I was bombarded with my thanator’s excitement and desire to run while she in turn absorbed my desire to finish the video and get back to training and so she reluctantly settled onto my lap, uncaring that she was slightly too big for it to be comfortable.

I shrugged guiltily at the camera; I pitied the heart attack Max would most definitely have when he watched Tanhì’s rather unexpected entrance to the video and could only imagine how fast he’d send a message to Norm—who had an electronic journal just like mine—to tell him and Jake about the newest (and terrifying) development.

“This is Tanhì—I made the neural bond, _tsaheylu_, with her after her mother died from another thanator attack. The mother was an outlier with odd purple markings; the outward difference most likely prompted the attack but that’s just a theory. Anyway, Lielu—” I paused to move the laptop so that the camera could capture a few seconds of Lielu as she worked on halter-training a young direhorse. “—made _tsaheylu _with a direhorse when it was born and it mimicked a really fascinating bond that I think you’d go nuts for, Max—here, mammals bond with their mothers when they’re born and its that bond that jumpstarts their systems and teaches them their social cues while they’re still physically dependent on their mothers. I did that with Tanhì, and that’s where it gets crazy because the core instincts—to hunt, to mate, to defend territory—are still very much intact but the social is completely altered from what a wild thanator would have. It worries me for when she gets older and meets other thanators but that’s a worry for future Sara. The average lifespan is around 40 years for thanators, so mating and all that is a _long_ ways away for her—isn’t it, Tanhì?”

Tanhì looked up at me at the sound of her name and licked the underside of my chin with a raspy tongue. I made a disgusted sound and pushed her face away before focusing back on the camera.

“So me mothering a thanator aside, the Txampfya is in three weeks,” I said, grimacing as that fact settled into my brain despite my attempts to be objective about it. “I’m not sure if I’ll be ready to take on a banshee by then, or if I even _should_—Tanhì takes up a lot of my time.”

I was about to go into more depth about my training when I felt a warm body crouch down beside me, scaring me out of my goddamn _mind _and causing me to shriek loudly before flinging my body away from the intruding presence. Tanhì yowled at the sudden movement and disconnected her neural strands from mine with a very irritated huff before prancing to join Lielu on her side of the clearing. I scrambled to right the electronic journal and sent a withering look in Kinak’s direction.

The asshole was _smirking_.

“You really couldn’t have given a girl some warning, Kinak?” I asked, so flustered by the fact that my embarrassing moment was caught on _camera _that I forgot to switch to Na’vi. The idiot in question simply shrugged before leaning down so that his head was in frame, blinking when he saw his own face appear.

“What are you doing?” he asked, and I held up a finger to the camera before turning to Kinak and switching to Na’vi.

“Trying to send a message. Can you give me a moment?”

Kinak frowned. “If I can still sneak up on you so easily, you clearly need to stop this message and train more.”

“Hey, I had Tanhì in my lap and _she _didn’t give me any warning so I don’t—”

“That is because you spoil her.”

I gaped at him, and when he didn’t take the statement back I let out a surprised laugh. “Oh, so we’re going there?”

Kinak simply stared at me; the lack of understanding behind his blank expression caused a strangled sound to escape me.

“Okay, _buddy_,” I began, saying ‘buddy’ in English and in a tone that clearly suggested the meaning behind the seemingly innocent word. “Who is it that’s started to bring spare pieces of _yerik _meat in his bag so that Tanhì follows him instead of me?”

Kinak’s face didn’t chance but his ears twitched in what I knew was embarrassment—I had discovered in the past several weeks of surprising civility that he was a terrible liar to those who knew how to read him.

“That is so you can focus on training instead of—”

I laughed again. “And don’t think I haven’t spotted the _cuddling_! You spoil her just as much as I do! If you try to say different I swear I’ll have her _ignore _you.”

Kinak’s eyes narrowed. “She wouldn’t do that.”

I raised a brow. “I can be _very _convincing,” I assured him, smirking when his jaw clenched. He didn’t say another word, though, and I mentally patted myself on the back before turning back to the journal screen.

“This is Kinak, by the way. He’s Lielu’s younger brother by…how many years?” I asked Kinak in way of a truce, and the Na’vi beside me rolled his eyes before gracefully lowering himself into a seated position. Even bigger than the shock of him actually _sitting down _was when he responded to the question in English:

“Lielu is twenty-three years, and I am twenty. You are also twenty, but your human body was twenty-five.”

I stared at him way longer than was normal and it _showed _if Kinak’s puzzled look was anything to go by. How in the hell did he know how old my human body had been? Speaking of that, how did he know how old my _current _body was? I hadn’t even known it until fairly recently—and he didn’t have the science or the testing behind that number like I did.

“How do you know how old this body is?” I asked without thinking, pushing aside for the moment the part about my human body because maybe Sänume had told him, or maybe Citra had done the math from when Dr. Augustine talked about me all those years ago.

Kinak glanced to the camera; the wariness in his eyes made me reach out to flick his ear with a familiarity I wouldn’t have dreamed of using a few weeks ago. I was rewarded with a half-hearted hiss and him meeting my gaze.

“The videos go directly to one of my best friends, Max. He’s one of the good humans, I promise,” I said quietly in English. “He’s a scientist, like me, but he focuses on the link process between human and Avatar as well as studying the brain patterns of Pandoran animals—you know, because of _tsaheylu_. He’ll delete this video if it has anything potentially damaging to the Na’vi.”

Kinak stared at me for several long seconds before nodding. He reached out, then, and touched several spots on my face. It was an entirely unexpected touch and so I blamed the blush on that, instead of letting in any other dumb theories. In the back of my brain I registered that he was touching the spots where, in darkness, my bioluminescent markings shone bright.

“Every year, new…_brightness _appears—new _tanhì,_” he said haltingly.

“So _tanhì _means both ‘star’ and ‘bioluminescent freckle’,” I clarified, both for myself and for Max, who would be watching the video at some point.

Kinak nodded. His fingers didn’t move from my face as he continued, “You have number that says you are twenty years—my sister has more, more that say she is twenty-three.”

I frowned. “Then why don’t the older Na’vi have more pronounced bioluminescence?”

“The change is…small. No big, like glowing lizard. Takes…_focus _to see them.”

He snatched his hands back, then, his expression darkening as he sent another look at the screen. Without warning he pushed himself to his feet and stomped over to where Lielu was play-wrestling with a delighted Tanhì, ignoring my attempts to ask him what was wrong. 

Not in the mood to decipher Kinak’s odd behavior, I turned back to the screen and shrugged.  
  
“A bit hot and cold, sure, but he’s a good guy,” I admitted. “I like to think we’re becoming friends but when he goes and runs away I’m back to wondering if he’s secretly plotting my death.”

I then launched into several long-winded ramblings about the flora and fauna surrounding the Tipani Hometree as well as the brief visit I had made along with the rest of the Txampfya hopefuls to the eastern Tipani village—the village was a short direhorse ride from the ocean, and on clear nights one could see the very distant fires of the Ikran Clan that lived much further up the coast.

Fifteen minutes later I said an awkward goodbye and closed the laptop, sliding it back into its padded case and putting it into the leather backpack I had crudely fashioned two weeks ago. It wasn’t customary for the Tipani to use such things but old habits died hard; back when I was still working for the RDA, I wouldn’t have been caught dead without my research backpack when taking samples from the jungle just outside of Hell’s Gate. Sure, my body had changed, but my mind was just as driven by habit as before.

Obviously I didn’t bring the bag when I went scouting or running in the woods with Teril or Kinak, but for when I was taking investigatory walks on my own…I always brought it—inside were two of Dr. Augustine’s books (one on flora and the other on fauna), a full water bag, a spare knife and a large waterproof notebook for me to take notes on anything I found. 

I walked over to where Kinak, Lielu and Tanhì were all gathered. I had to stop before they could notice me; because the sight was something I wasn’t sure I wanted to interrupt. Kinak was kneeling beside Tanhì, scratching at the spot right behind her spines that never _didn’t _need attending to and looking up at his sister as she gushed about the young direhorse’s progress. I hadn’t had many opportunities to watch Kinak and Lielu interact without me around, and to see Kinak—gruff, stern Kinak—smile so indulgently at his older sister who wasn’t taken nearly as seriously as she should be within the Clan…it made a hot tightness take hold in my chest.

_I wish that you were here to see this, Dr. Augustine. I wish I could share this feeling of…of…_

I couldn’t find the word, then, but Dr. Augustine would have known what I meant without asking; she had _always _known. Her ability to help me find the words for how I felt was something I didn’t realize how much I relied on until she was gone.

Blinking back the tears that threatened, I straightened my spine and continued on my original path. 

* * *

The word I had been looking for came to me like a slap to the face later that night, while I sat with Teril and Sana and attempted to learn how to carve beads of my own. Not much carving got done since the sisters were so focused on Tanhì—it shocked me how quickly the Clan accepted her presence, considering her rather tense introduction almost a month ago—but I appreciated the company much more than the potential of learning something new.

The sisters were laughing about something their uncle had said about how men approached women after becoming warriors and waggled their brows at me to include me in the innuendo. If Tanhì hadn’t moved to curl around my legs at the moment she did, I wouldn’t have looked up and I would have missed the sight of Kinak glancing at me from across the fire. He was talking to another Tipani warrior, someone I had seen talking to Lielu whenever he came to the direhorse pen to go riding, but his gaze kept shifting over to me.

The moment he realized he was caught, the bioluminescent markings on his face pulsed with light for a brief moment, a greeting I had read about in Dr. Augustine’s Na’vi culture book but had never seen with my own two eyes. It was such a quiet thing, very much like a glance shared across a fire, and I felt my own skin respond in kind—not with _heat_, per say, but rather a pulse of energy that my instincts linked to the markings on my face.

Lielu joined the two men, then, pulling Kinak’s attention back to his conversation. Teril’s gaze followed mine until she found the trio. The tall, beautiful warrior-to-be snorted under her breath, leaning forward to better watch them, a calculating look crossing her face.

“I wonder how long it’ll take O’tak to begin the courting.”

“With _Kinak_?” I blurted out, my voice high with something that was definitely _not _panic, and Sana burst into giggles. Kinak’s eyes found mine once more and I hurried to look away, back to Teril and Sana—who were watching me more closely than I would have liked. Sana looked across the fire; something in the girl’s face must have sent a clear message because Kinak’s ears pinned and he hurried to turn his back.

“Would you be bothered if it was?” Teril asked, drawing my attention back, and her teasing tone made my ears flick backwards in irritation.

“Of _course _not! I just didn’t…I didn’t know if same-gender couples happened among the Na’vi,” I hurriedly said, which was some part true and some part _not. _Teril hummed in answer before exchanging a look with her sister that I didn’t even want to _begin _analyzing.

Sana shrugged. “It’s not as common as male-female pairings but it definitely happens. A mating is approved—or disapproved—by Eywa. It isn’t about gender; it’s about compatibility of body, mind and heart.”

I nodded. “Good to know.”

Teril finally took pity on me. “I was talking about O’tak and _Lielu_, Sara.”

My breath released in a rush of understanding. “Oh.”

Sana bumped her shoulder against mine as she picked up her carving knife. “For a _tìftiatu kifkeyä _you’re unobservant. _Very _unobservant.”

The sisters burst out laughing, much to my chagrin, and I took advantage of their moment of distraction in order to glance over at the group across the fire. Kinak was deep in conversation with the other man, both of them smiling. Lielu waved at me when she spotted me—I could see it now, the way O’tak looked at her when she wasn’t paying attention.

The word came to me as I grinned and waved back.

_Home_. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Na'vi Translations: 
> 
> Olo'eyktan: Clan Leader
> 
> yerik: hexapede
> 
> tanhì: star, bioluminescent freckle
> 
> tìftiatu kifkeyä: scientist


	9. Protect

My bare feet padded through the thick grass of the training field. I glanced down at Tanhì, who silently ran alongside me with her eyes trained on my face. Without giving her any warning I yelled: “Stop!” in Na’vi but kept on running. I grinned when instead of ignoring the command, as she had in the early stages, Tanhì stopped in her tracks and remained still even when I stopped about twenty yards ahead and turned to look back. Her hindquarters wriggled slightly but she didn’t move forward. I waited until she had quieted completely before slapping the side of my right thigh two times—the nonverbal ‘stay close’ signal.

In an instant she bounded forward and smoothly circled me—her quills carefully tucked to avoid pricking my skin—until she stood close to my right side, and there she stayed even when I walked forward and took several sharp turns in random directions. The release from ‘stay close’ came in the form of pat on the head and a spoken ‘go on’ in Na’vi. The thanator stepped away; her youth showed as she pranced around and made the low growl in her throat that told me she was hungry. 

“You’ve trained her well,” Citra commented in English from her seated position on a nearby log.

One thing I couldn’t seem to figure out was why Citra was so insistent on speaking English when we were alone. I wasn’t complaining, though, since I didn’t get many other chances to speak my native tongue. Some days it just felt good to rattle away and _not_ have to think about verb conjugation and proper syntax. 

I couldn’t help but puff up a bit at the woman’s rare offering of praise while Tanhì settled for mock-biting my calf; the grip on my leg was so gentle that the teeth didn’t even come close to breaking the skin.

_She’s growing so fast_, I mused as I crouched down to praise her for a job well done. At six weeks old, she was twice the size she had been during the direhorse pen video log and her teeth and claws had fully hardened into formidable weapons. I kept unconsciously comparing her growth to those of big cats back on Earth but realized that this planet’s ecological standards were vastly different to Earth ones; creatures on Pandora had to grow fast and strong, or die.

Txampfya was in three days.

Citra had surprised the entire training group that morning by announcing that there weren’t going to be any more formal training sessions. She said that it was to give our bodies time to rest as well as encourage us to train individually based on our specific needs. This meant that for the first time since Tanhì’s arrival to Hometree, Citra had an entire afternoon free to monitor the thanator’s training instead of short snippets of time in-between her regular training sessions. 

From day one, Citra’s intuitive approach to training Tanhì was more helpful than I ever could have imagined—her no-nonsense presence as well as her increasingly creative suggestions for teaching Tanhì to mind me even in stressful situations proved invaluable. It had been her idea to have both a verbal and nonverbal command for ‘stop’, ‘come’ and ‘attack’, in case there was ever a situation in which discretion was needed. I had balked at the addition of ‘attack’ to the slowly growing list of commands, but Citra had fixed me with one of her infamous scowls when I spoke up about it.

I pressed my forehead to Tanhì’s increasingly larger one and tried not to think too hard about a situation in which I’d need that command. Citra had been brutal; going so far as to fashion a dummy shaped like a Na’vi and covered in both animal and Na’vi blood—her own, much to my horror when she told me a few days after the fact—to give Tanhì a target.

It had taken Citra manipulating the dummy and using it to wield a sharp dagger in my direction while I was bonded with the thanator and urging her to attack—_protect_, I had secretly emphasized—for Tanhì to realize what the command meant. I still wasn’t sure how to feel about the fact that ‘attack’ was the easiest command for Tanhì to learn. I supposed that I shouldn’t take it too badly; she was a predator, after all, and she had killing instincts even if she managed to divert those instincts while she was around the Na’vi.

“I couldn’t have done it without you, Citra,” I declared, hiding a smile when Tanhì sidled up to Citra and crooned for attention.

Citra rolled her eyes but gave Tanhì a brusque pat on the head—by Citra standards it was basically a cuddle and the thanator knew it, too, if the pleased shivering of her quills was anything to go on.

“And Lielu? How is her progress?”

I leaned down to shoulder my backpack and put on my knife belt, frowning as I considered the older woman’s question.

“Tanhì minds her, but it’s still tricky when I’m around.”

The older woman didn’t seem at all surprised. “It’s to be expected—she knows your authority is stronger than anyone else’s and her lack of desire to listen to Lielu when you’re present reflects that. Very much like Na’vi children, I’ll admit.”

I nodded. “In any case, I’m confident in Lielu’s authority when I’m _not _around. I’ve been consistent about familiarizing her with both Lielu and Kinak’s commands through _tsaheylu_, but of course it’s different in person—”

“Kinak?” Citra interrupted.

I looked up from where I was tying off my weapon belt to find her staring at me with an odd expression on her face. Racking my brain for what the problem could be, I needlessly adjusted the straps on my shoulders—anything to channel some of the nervous energy building up with every second that passed.

“It got too hard to keep Tanhì away from him and so I asked him if he wanted to join Lielu in helping me train her.”

“And he said _yes_?”

“Yeah…?” I replied uncertainly, at which Citra scoffed.

“Don’t look so terrified; you’re not on _trial_, here. I just wouldn’t have thought Kinak to be interested in that sort of thing,” she explained, giving me a firm cuff over the head for good measure. After giving us a disinterested glance at the sound of my yelp of pain, Tanhì (the _traitor_) continued her search for the small ferret-like creatures that sometimes burrowed in the grasses of the field.

“You and me both,” I grumbled, rubbing at the tender spot on my head and glaring at the woman before me. Citra’s odd mood seemed to melt away when I did; she sent me a smirk before dismissing me for the rest of the afternoon. 

* * *

Having almost the entire afternoon and evening free was a foreign concept after two months of near-constant activity. Instead of collapsing into my hammock for a well-deserved nap, like I would have done before becoming Na’vi for good, I felt restless in a way that forced me to keep moving.

After making a pit stop at the small shelf in the communal area that held my personal items, I made my way up into the higher levels of Hometree with a slab of raw _yerik _meat for Tanhì and a basket of weaving supplies for myself—I was in the process of making a padded sitting mat for Citra, one that I would get Sana’s help in dyeing with a thanator paw-print pattern once the basic structure was finished.

“Just a little farther, sweet-pea,” I murmured to Tanhì as she hesitantly maneuvered the immense spiraling staircase—as always, a stab of bittersweet pain shot me through me because Dad had called me ‘sweet-pea’. I never thought I would use it for anyone else after he died but from the moment Tanhì opened her eyes, ‘sweet-pea’ came more naturally than any Na’vi endearment.

Coming toward us from the opposite direction was a father and his toddler; the little one waddled ahead of him and giggled madly as the father desperately tried to keep up. Tanhì’s ears perked up and through the bond—I had taken to bonding with her whenever we explored the higher levels of Hometree in order to help her feel more comfortable with being so high up—I could feel the deeply rooted maternal instincts flare up. Even though she knew that the Na’vi weren’t the same species as she was she still felt a strong desire to be accepted, though I suspect that _that _particular desire was something she had picked up from me.

The Na’vi child caught sight of Tanhì and let out an adorable squeal of excitement before dashing forward with arms outstretched. The child’s legs were still so unstable, though, and a dip in the root caused her to tip sideways—right over the ledge.

It all happened so quickly that I could only blink, the panicked yell of the father loud in my ears and the feel of Tanhì rushing past me an almost distant thing. Heart in my throat, I watched as the sleek form of my thanator darted forward, reached out with one of her four front legs and scooped the Na’vi child back onto the safety of the thick staircase. Once the child was seated on the wood, Tanhì whined unhappily and carefully nuzzled the child in search of any injuries.

The father’s jaw dropped in shock right along with mine when the child—blissfully ignorant of how much danger she had been in—laughed at the thanator’s ministrations and patted her tiny hands all over Tanhì’s face. The neural bond had broken when the thanator moved forward but I didn’t need it to sense how pleased Tanhì was at the child’s touch. Wary of the father’s reaction, I quickly leaned down and carefully extracted the child from the space between Tanhì’s legs.

“Tanhì would keep your daughter there all day if she could—she’s always been protective of children,” was my attempt at breaking the ice as I placed the squirming little girl back into the man’s trembling arms. I hadn’t gotten a good look at him before and now noticed that he had a small tattoo across his forehead.

Sänume had told me during one of our evening lessons that while all Na’vi could adorn themselves with decorative paint, only those who had completed healer training (for most clans the training consisted of two years of intensive study and two more years of apprenticeship under the highest ranked healer) could tattoo themselves. The tattooing was optional but the vast majority of healers chose to receive the mark—Sänume described the choice as ‘the purest form of vanity, done so that all Na’vi can easily identify them as healers in times of trouble’.

The man swallowed hard, pressing his forehead against his daughter’s and taking a deep breath before looking back at me.

“How is it possible that a _palulukan _wishes to protect children?” he asked in a hoarse voice, his eyes flicking down to where Tanhì was seated beside me, her eyes on the still-squirming child but her body language completely at ease.

I froze at the question, stunned that the man was still _there_—much less that he was asking me _questions _about Tanhì’s abilities. I recovered fairly quickly, though, reaching back to retrieve my queue braid and link it with Tanhì’s. The man watched with open fascination as the thanator beside me leaned her head against my hip and growled contentedly at the familiar contact.

“Tanhì is young but her maternal instincts are still very much there. _Tsaheylu _has strengthened those instincts where the Na’vi are concerned, I think.”

The healer’s brow furrowed but he didn’t appear to be disbelieving (as I had half-expected).

“If she hadn’t been here, Renali would’ve…” He trailed off as we both looked down into the shadowy depths of the lower levels and his arms tightened around the babbling toddler. I smiled in an attempt to ease the man’s clear discomfort at the thought of what could have happened. 

“Renali is a beautiful name,” I commented, waving at the girl when she met my eye and smiling wider when I received an astounded frown in response—my too-many fingers never ceased to amaze Na’vi children (and adults, though they at least _attempted _to be subtle).

The man cracked a smile at that. “Thank you,” he murmured, his eyes once more drifting to focus on the thanator by my side. “And thank you, Tanhì,” he said, and I blinked when he knelt down and adjusted his grip on Renali so that he could slowly reach out one hand to Tanhì.

It was the first time a Tipani other than Kinak, Lielu or Citra had ever acknowledged the thanator in such a way. I let out a shaky breath as Tanhì sent a mental nudge my way—_friend?_

I sent an immediate affirmative back through the bond and watched as Tanhì let out a rumbling purr and nudged the Na’vi healer’s hand over her head so that he could stroke the skin below her lowermost quill. His eyes were shining when he retraced his hand a few moments later; he even chuckled a bit when Tanhì leaned forward to lick at Renali’s outstretched hands.

“You weren’t exaggerating about her desire to be near children,” he said as he straightened.

I nodded. “It’s difficult to keep her away, sometimes. I know she makes the parents nervous, though, so I make her keep her distance.”

The man stood taller, shifting his daughter to a more comfortable position on his hip. “Avoiding them only shows doubt on your part—you only confirm their assumptions when you keep her hidden from sight.”

Tanhì butted her head into my leg as if to agree with the man. He smiled at the gesture and used his free hand to arc his fingers from his brow to his chest—the informal first-meeting gesture. 

“I am Etae.”

I tucked a few braids behind my ear before hesitantly repeating the gesture. “I’m Sara.”

Etae made to walk past me, then, but before he moved out of sight he placed a hand on my shoulder.

“You have a place at my fire, Sara, from this moment until the end of my daughter’s days.”

And with that he was gone, walking down the staircase with his child securely in his grasp—I had a feeling that he wouldn’t be letting her walk the staircase on her own two feet for _quite _a while. My shoulder was still warm from his touch and my mind was _racing _in the wake of his declaration. Dr. Augustine had gone over verbal contracts and life debts in great detail and so it was impossible for me to misinterpret Etae’s offering: in saving his daughters life, I had gained Etae and his family as allies for as long as his daughter lived.

Tanhì growled at the emotional upheaval, gently unlinking from me and padding ahead as I retrieved my fallen items and continued walking upward. For all that she was affectionate and loving towards me, there was only so much complex emotion she could take before she needed to retreat into her more straightforward animal mind.

By the time we reached the highest level I had calmed myself enough to start chatting to Tanhì again, praising her when she made an effort to keep her balance on the moss-covered roots instead of yowling for me to rescue her as she had done a few weeks ago.

Still murmuring sweet encouragements, I turned the corner to my favorite weaving spot but froze when I found someone already there, legs crossed as he watched the banshee riders take off from the banshee-nest part of Hometree located one level below.

Kinak hadn’t noticed me yet, too engrossed in the sight of the four fliers streaking across the sky on their brightly colored mounts. In his expression was the same raw longing I had seen when he asked about my first bond with Tanhì.

The yearning slid off his face when Tanhì let out a small growl of delight upon finding him, replaced by a small smile that sent surprising warmth up and down my spine. After luring Tanhì away from Kinak by tossing her the _yerik _meat, I settled down beside him and joined in staring out at the quickly disappearing warriors.

He waited until they had vanished completely before saying:

“I’m sorry.”

I blinked. “For what?”

“I came to your quiet place without permission,” he explained, staring down at the distant jungle floor. His face was bathed in late afternoon light in a way that highlighted the masculine sharpness of his jaw. It was kind of funny; when I first came to the Tipani Hometree I had found male Na’vi features so alien and harsh but after two months I suddenly found myself appreciating them in a way that I never would have expected.

Kinak wasn’t handsome like Jake was—to be fair, _that _asshole had won the genetic jackpot in both human _and _Na’vi form so it was hardly a fair comparison—but the longer I looked at him, the more I realized that the lack of human features didn’t make him less appealing. It was no wonder that Ninoa couldn’t keep her eyes off of him. I had a sneaking suspicion that the two were an item, though I hadn’t seen them together outside of training since Tanhì’s arrival to Hometree.

An unexpected jolt of acid bitterness accompanied the memory of Ninoa following Kinak around during the last six weeks of training; in the beginning she had even gone so far as to step in between him and Tanhì to better occupy his attention. If an outsider like me had noticed her behavior I’m sure it was positively scandalous by Tipani standards. I swallowed the hard, angry lump that had risen in my throat and focused on my reply.

“I’m the one who should apologize, I think—this is _your _home,” I joked. The sound of Kinak’s teeth clicking together in irritation made me look over at him; his tail was flicking behind him in an erratic pattern.

“Why do you keep doing that?” he asked, turning in his seat so that he faced me.

I frowned. “Doing what?”

“Reminding yourself that you don’t belong here—that Hometree isn’t your home.”

My mouth opened and shut again just as quickly. Kinak’s gaze bore into mine with such a piercing quality that my body’s instincts urged me to run in order to escape it. I racked my brain trying to recall instances in which I had done what he claimed but the stress of the unexpected question rendered my memory much more lacking than usual. 

“I don’t…wait, why do you even _care_? When we met you made it _very _clear that dreamwalkers weren’t welcome,” I shot back at him.

I crossed my arms over my chest while he threw up his hands in wordless exasperation and wondered if, like me, he was wishing he had a banshee to jump on and make a hasty exit from this conversation.

A few seconds later he let out a deep sigh and the tension bled out of his shoulders. I tried to hold onto my anger, just to spite him, but the sight of him so actively choosing to set aside the irritation made it impossible not to follow in his footsteps. I let out a breath of my own and stared at my five-fingered hands as they nervously twisted together.

“It’s as you said the day we found Tanhì: my anger isn’t for humans, or even dreamwalkers, but for one specific person,” he finally admitted, his voice rough and low. I peeked up from my hands to find him looking at me again; his gaze was softer and more searching than it had been before.

Kinak must have seen something in my face that revealed the inner turmoil that sprouted at the mention (however indirect) of Dr. Augustine, because after a moment he reached out to flick at my ear. I narrowed my eyes at the irritating touch and he chuckled. 

“You can ask.”

A shuddering breath escaped me at the soft words, at the _permission _that I had wondered many a time if I would ever receive where this subject was concerned. Tanhì looked up from her raw meat at the sound and I hurried to give her a raised fist—the nonverbal ‘no threat’. Pacified, she sent a rumbling purr in my direction before returning to her half-eaten meal.

Kinak didn’t push for me to ask my questions, patient in a way that reminded me of Max whenever he encountered a problem—always calm, never letting his temper run away with him like it so often did with me.

Where to begin? _How _to begin? Was there an easy way to begin the conversation about a woman that had changed both of our lives so irrevocably?

I only needed a moment’s thought before I had my answer—_nope_—but the answer didn’t matter because Kinak was waiting for me to start and I had to be brave. I stared out into the forest and felt the now-familiar ache of grief begin to harden in my chest, as it always did whenever I let myself linger in the memories of my mentor.

“Do you miss her?” I asked, watching the wind ripple the tops of the jungle canopy below instead of watching for his response. I heard the intake of breath as well as the shift of his legs as he mimicked my posture—facing the expansive trees rather than look at me directly.

“Yes. After the Battle, I went to the place where she is buried and I…” He trailed off; I pretended not to notice the emotional tensing of his voice when he mentioned her being buried.

“But you’re still angry at her?” I pressed, stealing a glance at him as I did so.

Kinak nodded but raised a hand when I made to ask more questions. When he spoke again it was with the slow rhythm of someone prepared to speak for a long time:

“I was nine years old when Grace was found by some hunters on patrol. She spoke very poor Na’vi, then, but she knew enough, thanks to her brief encounters with the Omaticaya, to communicate that she was a human scientist in a false Na’vi body that wanted to study the Na’vi in an attempt to foster peace between humans and Na’vi. My aunt had just been named Olo’eyktan and, against the judgment of her Council, let Grace stay. The elders of the Clan never fully accepted her but the children adored her—myself included.

“Grace was with us for five years. The evil hadn’t yet arrived at that point and so she was free to roam as she pleased so long as she could prove that it was furthering knowledge. She visited other Clans, it’s true, but she always came back to Hometree. She and my mother became very close and my sister and I spent all of our free time with her. I had never known what it was like to have two parents—my father was killed by an alpha _'__angtsìk _right before I was born—but in those years I got a glimpse of what would have been like. I wanted to be just like her, let her fill my head with soft ideas and stupidly believed that she loved us more than she loved the destructive humans that were beginning to arrive in swarms.

Later, I learned that my aunt had been a few days from asking Grace if she wished to become One of the People when, without any warning, Grace packed up all of her belongings and left Hometree forever. A few months later we heard rumors that she was communicating with the Omaticaya and proposing peace between them and humans, just like she had with us, only as the years went by she made more and more efforts to establish herself with them—she even opened a school, like she had talked about so often with my sister and I. She _used _us, Sara, used us to learn Na’vi and become familiar with our ways and then left once she had taken all she could take. My mother cried when she left—it was the first time I ever saw her cry—and didn’t say a single word for three days. I saw how much her abandonment hurt my family, how much it _still _hurts them, and so after the tears were done with I decided that I would never let a human close enough to do that again.”

I was openly staring by the time he finished but couldn’t find it in me to care if he noticed. His face was drawn with lines of grief even as he spoke with a neutral tone; for an instant all I wanted to do was reach out and smooth the deep crease on his brow with my fingertips but I clenched my hands into fists to stifle the urge.

The image of a much younger Kinak eagerly following after Dr. Augustine flooded into my mind along with shock at the realization that my mentor had probably crouched down and shown him unique specimens in the surrounding foliage, just as she had whenever we had gone out in the field together.

As the surprise waned, anger and hurt replaced it because Dr. Augustine had _lied _to me—had lied to _everyone_. I had known that Dr. Augustine had been on Pandora for the six years that it took to complete the construction of Hell’s Gate before the second wave of humans arrived—that group included Max and myself along with the first squadrons of highly trained RDA soldiers—but she had _lived _with the Tipani Clan for most of those years!

How had those years been left out of any of the reports of Na’vi-human contact? How had Dr. Augustine so thoroughly wiped any remnants of her time with the Tipani from RDA records?

More importantly: why hadn’t Dr. Augustine trusted me enough to tell me the truth of how she had learned Na’vi so well when I asked? Her explanation had been that she had stayed with a variety of Clans for brief amounts of time before gaining the trust of the Omaticaya and learned Na’vi fluently by spending extended time with them. The reality was that, if Kinak’s timeline was accurate, she had probably used the language skill and cultural knowledge gained from the Tipani to convince the Omaticaya that it would be beneficial for the Clan to learn English, thus gaining permission to build the school inside of Omaticaya territory.

Tears of frustration pricked at the corners of my eyes. I blinked them away but more came despite my efforts. I let out a shaky laugh when Tanhì abandoned her mostly-finished steak to come and curl up between Kinak and myself, offering me her neural sheath with a low whine. I made _tsaheylu _almost desperately, _anything _to escape the too-intense feelings that were rising inside of me. Her less emotional perspective smoothed over the pain and helped dim the piercing ache.

The touch of a hand on my shoulder made me jump—I had been busy distinguishing the various smells in the air and losing myself within the strength of Tanhì’s still-growing limbs.

“She didn’t tell you?” Kinak asked, the rich smell of his skin and the faint stripes on his face sharply present thanks to the thanator’s enhanced senses bleeding into my own. I shook my head, trying to turn away, but his fingers—only three aside from his thumb, the alien pressure familiar by now but still so _odd _when my brain decided to fixate on it—tightened and prevented the movement.

Kinak must have felt my tension because with a sigh he released me, albeit reluctantly, and settled a hand on Tanhì’s back instead. She flicked an ear in his direction—not even her focus on comforting me could prevent her from acknowledging one of her favorite people, it seemed.

My anger spiked again, this time directed at Kinak.

“So that’s what you think of me?” I asked incredulously. “That I’m here to use the Tipani and leave once I have enough ‘data’?”

Kinak’s mouth quirked into a frown but he didn’t back down. “It’s what being a scientist _is_, Sara—Grace said it to me often; that a scientist’s duty is to remain objective, to keep emotions separate from the task at hand. It’s not in their nature to care for things that don’t benefit their research.”

His voice was diplomatic but the words slapped at me so forcefully that I flinched backwards and ducked my head as tears streaked down my cheeks. He tried to reach out to me but I had had enough. Tanhì instantly responded to my hurt, firmly placing herself between Kinak and myself and baring her teeth—a rare show of aggression.

I kept Tanhì in her position and got to my feet, ignoring the raw emotion in his voice when he said my name. God, even when I was crazy levels of angry I _still _loved the way he said it—what the fuck was _wrong _with this Avatar body that it reacted so strongly to things it shouldn’t?

Biting my lip to prevent the sobs from escaping, I sent one last silent command to Tanhì before disconnecting from _tsaheylu_. The thanator growled in displeasure but remained motionless even as I walked away. I heard my baby snarl when Kinak made to follow me and felt a warm glow of pride even through the hurt—she had _listened_.

“Sara, _please_!”

I ignored him and began to run. The smells of Hometree invaded my awareness as I whipped around the curve of the central column that held the wide, curving ramp leading down to lower levels. In the past few weeks those smells had become familiar, as familiar as the warm comfort of my parents’ house on Earth and the astringent smell that swept over me every time I entered the RDA labs. Now, however, they served as a reminder that I _wasn’t _Na’vi, that nothing about my human mind or biology helped me in this wild, untamed world I had jumped headfirst into. My mind was using the Avatar body to blend in but I would never truly _be _Na’vi—I was an imposter, a _scientist _as Kinak put it, and that’s all I would ever be no matter how many adornments I was given or if I passed the Txampfya.

All of my intelligence, all the renowned intellect that had snagged the attention of Dr. Augustine, allowed me to advance so far beyond my peers and sparked Sänume to invite me into the Tipani Clan hadn’t kept me from stupidly assuming that Kinak was on my side and _that _was the worst part.

My vision became so blurred with tears that I had to stop after only one level down, gasping for breath as I leaned heavily against the center column. The smell of moss and fresh air soothed me ever so slightly, enough for me to look back up at the opening to the spot where Kinak and Tanhì were. My chest tightened at the thought of his callous words, the calmness in his gaze that clearly said that he had _no_idea how cruel his statement was—the ignorance behind the words made them even more hurtful.

I turned to continue my descent only to freeze when I felt the skin on the back of my neck prickle in warning. My entire body tensed, searching for the threat, and when I glanced to my right—

A slender body collided into mine, sending me sprawling onto my back. My head hit the stairway so hard that spots danced before my eyes and my entire body went involuntarily limp. Blinking past the haze, I saw that a Na’vi woman I didn’t know had straddled me, her green eyes—Na’vi could have green eyes?—wild and furious as she pressed a knife against my throat.

“Please—” I got out before she landed a hit on my face so hard that my teeth cut my lips and blood splattered onto the wood. She eyed the blood with satisfaction, her smugness growing when a thanator roar—still husky with youth but no less chilling because of it—filled the air a moment later. My sluggish brain was still spinning as I looked over the woman’s shoulder and saw a familiar shape speeding towards us.

The woman sat up, keeping the knife at my throat, and began to scream at the top of her lungs:

“Help! Somebody help! It’s going to kill me!”

I gasped as I realized the woman’s plan, my mind trying to wrap around how to _stop it_, and without thinking I began to struggle in earnest even as the knife’s edge cut my neck—shit, that _hurt_.

The woman’s eyes widened at the sight of the cut on my neck and in a jerky movement she pulled the knife away, wiping at my neck with her loincloth in an attempt to clear away the blood.

“Tanhì—” I wheezed, cut off when the stranger’s sweaty hand roughly clamped over my mouth. I took one shallow breath through my nose—that was the time it took for Tanhì to reach us. The woman’s fake cries rapidly changed into real ones when the thanator’s teeth closed over her shoulder and dragged her backwards.

Voices drew closer, marking the arrival of witnesses, and even in my shaky state my stomach dropped because they weren’t seeing the whole picture—they were just watching my baby rip into a seemingly innocent woman. My head was pounding so hard that the moment I attempted to sit up, the picture of a snarling Tanhì pinning the woman to the ground with one paw shimmered and tilted sharply on its axis—

My body crumpled back onto the moss-covered wood. How much time had passed? The woman was still screaming but for how much longer? 

Suddenly, someone shouted:

“Tanhì, _stop_!”


	10. Hand To Hold

If it had been anyone else but Kinak—if he hadn’t spoken with a cold, unyielding authority that he had never before used with the young thanator—I knew without a doubt that Tanhì would have ignored them and closed her jaws around the whimpering woman’s throat.

As it was, Tanhì paused, keeping a sharp-clawed paw very firmly on the woman’s chest to keep her in place and turning to give Kinak a defiant snarl. The young man didn’t break eye contact with the thanator, holding up one hand to halt the two men prepared to throw their spears as he walked in a slow circle so that he was directly in front of her. I felt hands helping me to my feet and it took a glance for me to recognize that the help came from one of the mothers of the children I rode with—I think her name was E’nev.

“Come, Tanhì,” Kinak commanded, eyes narrowing when Tanhì didn’t immediately obey. “_Come.” _

I could have cried with relief when Tanhì gave one last dissatisfied growl before lifting her paw off of the woman and padding over to where Kinak stood. She circled around his legs and sat down on his right side, eyes fixed on the bleeding woman with an intensity that frightened even me.

I felt another hand curve around my arm and turned to see Sänume moving forward to replace E’nev at my side. Her eyes were unreadable as she took in the sight of the woman—she had a female healer kneeling at her side and pressing a cloth to the jagged bite marks on her shoulder—and Kinak standing calmly beside a blood-splattered Tanhì.

“What happened?” she asked in the next moment, her eyes flicking to the back of my head where I was almost positive I was bleeding. We all flinched when the wounded woman let out a cry of pain. She was struggling to sit up despite the healer’s warnings; her green eyes locked on mine and the moment they did I couldn’t look away. 

“The palulukan tried to _kill _me! The dreamwalker tripped on the way down and hit her head, but when I went to help her it attacked!” she seethed and I felt my ears pin against my head at the blatant lie.

Worried murmurs swept through the crowd. Sänume’s grip tightened on my arm; a quick glance told me that the Clan Leader was staring the woman down with narrowed eyes and a curious tilt to her head. Not the reaction I was expecting, sure, but I didn’t waste time analyzing it.

Instead, I addressed the lie:

“I was walking down to the lower levels when _she _attacked _me_, then hit me hard enough to make me bleed. Instead of hurting me more, like I expected, she started yelling that ‘it’ was going to kill her. She attacked me because she _knew _Tanhì would protect me—she wanted to show that Tanhì is too dangerous to live.”

At the sound of her name, the thanator in question whined low in her throat and looked to Kinak, begging permission to go to me. He gave her a gentle pat on the head—the release—and she darted across the space in order to press her body against my legs. She was trembling; the panicky energy of the crowd was probably as overwhelming to her as it was to me. Her nostrils flared and in a sudden upward movement she stood on the back end of her four front legs, leaving her upper body free to stretch up and sniff at my neck. Sänume followed the thanator’s movements and her gaze zeroed in on the knife wound. I lifted a hand to touch it, and pulled away to find blood on my fingers.

Kinak stepped forward. 

“Olo’eyktan, Winan is the one who spoke of killing Sara and Tanhì that day,” he revealed, his eyes cold as they considerd the woman in question. “According to some, she was very angry that they were allowed to remain and has been trying to convince others of the _palulukan’s _‘true’ nature ever since.”

My head craned to the right so I could gawk at Kinak—ow, that movement did _not _feel good. He was staring at me but when I caught his eye he quickly returned his attention to Sänume.

The Clan Leader let out a contemplative sound. “And there’s the question of _this_,” she offered as she gently tilted my head so that the crowd could see my neck. The shallow wound felt tender and stung more and more with every passing second but I allowed her to move my head as she pleased—it was evidence that could save Tanhì’s life and I’d endure just about anything if it would help prove her innocence.

Winan’s face blanched as she caught sight of the wound. Her ears anxiously flicked backwards as she scanned the crowd for support. The group of Tipani was dead quiet; when I took my turn in scanning I was shocked to see more than a few glares directed at Winan.

Sänume’s face darkened. “I knew I should have addressed your words that night when Tanhì arrived but against my better judgment I trusted that your anger would soften and that you would come to your senses. I mourn your mate and son, as do we all, but this goes beyond distrust or grief—it has crossed the line into madness.”

Winan let out an inhuman screech of fury. “Her kind murdered _thousands _of our people and yet we _accept_ her? We let her bring _death _into our home and taint our minds with thoughts that the beast can be tamed? The madness is _yours_, Olo’eyktan, _not _mine!”

The entire group held its breath after Winan’s angry declaration but Sänume didn’t react beyond a slight pursing of her lips. I was so busy watching her that Kinak’s touch on my neck nearly made me jump out of my skin. He didn’t let my reaction deter him, however, carefully smoothing his fingers over my nape and giving a gentle squeeze. I almost gave in, almost leaned into the strength of his hold, but his words from earlier came back in a rush and I took a pointed step away.

Sänume turned to the gathered Na’vi—it really was a marvel that as many people were gathered as there were, considering the limited space of the stairway. 

“Spread the word—the Trial begins at dusk.”

Sharp cries of affirmation echoed as the spectators fled the scene. Kinak didn’t move from my side, not even when Sänume sent him a disapproving frown. The Clan Leader’s gaze flickered between the two of us and in an instant her expression smoothed in understanding. She sent me a sharp look before turning back to the healers still gathered around an eerily silent Winan. The adrenaline was fading and allowed me to better take in just how much damage Tanhì had done—the shoulder was clearly dislocated and several deep, bloody gashes from my baby’s teeth ran from her collarbone all the way over her shoulder.

The healers looked to their leader when Sänume approached.

“The wounds are mostly superficial, Olo’eyktan,” one of the older women murmured, the tattoo between her brows furrowing as she considered her patient. “There will be scarring—that much is unavoidable—but the _palulukan _didn’t bite hard enough to do any serious damage.”

Sänume nodded shortly. “Can she be moved?”

“Yes—my apprentice is getting the stretcher as we speak.”

“Thank you, Aseka,” the Clan Leader said sincerely before looking to Winan. I think that for a moment the woman forgot that Kinak and I were standing behind her because her shoulders sagged with unexpected emotion. I was close enough that, when she took a deep breath, I could see her hands tremble for the split second before she clenched them into fists.

The moment was broken by the arrival of the apprentice with the stretcher and without a hitch Sänume shifted right back into her usual composed, determined self. She helped the healers maneuver Winan onto the shallow woven structure, ignoring the woman’s hateful hiss as she did so, and we all watched as the healers hurried down the ramp.

Kinak’s hand closed around my elbow and my entire body tensed. He was saying something but I wasn’t listening, too focused on the fact that he thought he had the right to touch me, the right to _pretend _that he hadn’t completely insulted everything that I was—

White-hot anger surged. Without thinking, I ducked forward, escaped his grip and yanked that same elbow back into his face with all my strength. A sharp crack and a low groan of pain filled the air as his nose broke. Seething, I turned to look at him; his mouth and chin were wet with blood. 

“Don’t _touch _me,” I hissed.

Kinak’s eyes were a bit wild with pain but behind all that was the same solemn quietness I had grown accustomed to seeing from him even in times of stress. It was the jaw clench that gave him away—he was _pissed. _

Sänume stepped forward to better examine Kinak’s face, temporarily blocking him from my view, and after several seconds she retreated.

“Go to the healers; the nose is broken but it’s a clean break,” she mused, imperiously holding up a hand when her nephew’s chin jutted up in preparation to argue.

Kinak’s lips curled in distaste but after taking a deep breath he obediently lowered his head and walked away. I hated that I watched him leave, just to see if he would look back—hated that a sour feeling of disappointment bubbled up from deep within my chest when he didn’t. Tanhì whined, nosing at my hand for comfort, which I gave after shaking my shoulders to try and diffuse the tension still lingering under my skin.

Sänume didn’t speak to me again until after we walked down the stairway, avoided the crowds of frantically gossiping Tipani and entered her private living space. The Clan Leader area was against the inner wall of Hometree, sectioned off from the rest by three hanging leather barriers on each side that formed a large rectangle. As she closed the colorful woven door behind us I jumped at the chance to look around. 

A sleeping hammock was strung between two large jutting roots and several wooden shelves had been carved into the tree’s wall to store her things. I could see glimpses of her formal Clan Leader attire—a feathered headdress that she only wore during wartime or special occasions, a full display of carefully painted armor, various shells full of of face paint. A wooden bowl full of fresh water rested beside by the small fire pit and a small pouch of fragrant herbs leaned against it.

Sänume moved to the fire and set the bowl of water over the fire to heat it. Once it was bubbling she tossed in the herbs and immediately a sharp, floral scent filled the space. She didn’t speak, even when I asked her if I could sit down, instead focusing on letting the herbs steep and, once she was satisfied, transferring the hot tea into two bone cups that she fetched from the shelf closest to us. Tanhì curled up against my leg once I decided to chance sitting down next to the fire and we both watched as Sänume finished pouring and handed me a cup. Only then did she sit down herself, crossing her legs and facing me in one smooth motion. 

The woman let me squirm for a while; let me dangle in a way that felt suspiciously purposeful.

“Tell me,” she finally said. Her tone was casual but held the ever-present vein of command just under the surface.

I swallowed hard. “I was walking down to the lower levels when Winan—”

“No.”

Frowning, I sat back. “Then tell you what?”

Sänume’s eyes flashed impatiently. “Tell me why you broke my nephew’s nose, Sara. I assume there’s a reasonable explanation…or should I assume that you just _felt _like it?”

My face burned at that—I shouldn’t have expected any coddling from Sänume, that’s for damn sure. Tanhì yawned loudly and rested her head on my thigh, staring up at me with her huge amber eyes. I delicately traced the line of her brow and smiled without humor when she let out a pleased rumbling sound.

“_Sara_.”

“I just didn’t want him to touch me, that’s all,” I snapped back. 

“As the humans would say: _bullshit_.”

Scowling didn’t do anything to dissuade Sänume from pressing, if her raised brow and no-nonsense stare was anything to go by, and so after nearly a minute of stony silence I finally gave in:

“He told me about Grace—told me that scientists don’t care about anything unless it ‘benefits’ them. The worst is that I really thought…I thought that we were starting to become friends! I thought that I was different—”

I cut myself off, stomach clenching and my eyes stinging with the threat of tears. After clearing my throat I stared into the fire and watched the small reddish-orange flames dance just underneath the wooden bowl. I didn’t look away, not even when Sänume put a hand on my shoulder, not even when Tanhì licked my knee in an attempt to comfort me.

“One day,” Sänume said carefully. “I will tell you why Grace left. I think you of all people will understand her reasons—better than any Na’vi ever could—but this isn’t that day. Today is about Kinak and his poor choice of words.”

I frowned as my ears flicked backwards in annoyance. “He knew _exactly _what he was saying—”

Sänume’s hand on my shoulder tightened. “If he did not consider you a friend he would not seek out your company the way he does; his actions speak much louder than a few careless words.”

Teeth grinding together, I desperately tried to rein in my temper. “I don’t know what game he’s playing but I’m _tired _of it—he needs to choose how he feels about me and be _consistent _with it.”

“Change is a funny thing—sometimes it is slow and gradual but other times it happens very suddenly.” 

I opened my mouth to protest but an unwanted image of Jake’s face on the screen of my computer as I watched the last few video logs he posted made me pause. It had only been six months and yet the Jake who wheeled into the Avatar Station that first day and the Jake I had waved goodbye to as he went to the final transfer ceremony were two entirely different people.

Sänume’s expression was triumphant as she continued, “You _are _a scientist—that is a part of you, now and always—and _that _is what scares him. He is afraid to admit it because the moment he does he will be confronted with the reality that not all scientists are the same. It is easier to assume that it is in a scientist’s very _nature _to become unfeeling once they’ve achieved their goals than acknowledge that Grace _chose _to leave.”

Startled by the ideas her words sparked, I met her gaze. 

“We are what we choose,” came out of my mouth before I could stop to think through the words. Nodding, Sänume reached up to cradle my face in both of her hands. I leaned into the gesture, unsure as to when I had become so dependent on touch—as a human I had been physically distant with everyone but Jake and (later on) Norm.

Sänume’s large golden eyes were gentle as she sat back and picked up her cup once again.

“Kinak is—”

“What happens now?” I interrupted, tracing the painted pattern on the cup and unwilling to meet her eye. As much as I probably needed to come to terms with the Kinak situation, I just couldn’t—not right then.

Sänume sighed but allowed me to change the subject. “I believe your side of the story—the cut on your neck and Winan’s reaction to it speaks to your innocence—but it doesn’t matter what _I _think—the final vote will be made by all of Hometree and not just by those of us who know you well. If there are Tipani who feel that Tanhì is too dangerous...”

She trailed off, looking into the fire and letting me fill in the blanks. I pretended that my fingers weren’t shaking as I responded:

“I won’t let Citra kill her.”

There was no outward indication that the Clan Leader heard me, so I was surprised when her next words directly addressed my statement.

“The only other option would be to exile the both of you from Tipani territory. An exile cannot be undone, Sara.”

My hand on Tanhì froze and she growled at the lack of petting. Sänume’s expression was grim and unyielding; the face of a leader faced with a difficult choice and unwilling to let emotion affect her judgment.

Swallowing hard, I took a moment to gather my thoughts.

“If that happens, I’ll go back to Hell’s Gate,” I declared, ignoring Sänume’s hiss of disapproval. “It’s the best option I have; I doubt that even _Toruk Makto _could convince the Omaticaya to accept Tanhì, much less let her live in their Hometree”

Even Sänume couldn’t argue with that, it seemed, because she remained silent even as her mouth tightened in displeasure. After a minute of tense silence she ducked her head and quietly excused herself, reminding me that as per Tipani tradition, Winan and I were to remain in isolation from the rest of the Clan until the trial began.  
  
In other words: don’t leave the tent.

After she left, I leaned back so that my back touched the wooden wall of the living area and absentmindedly stroked Tanhì’s hip as I let my thoughts sort through what would happen if I were forced to leave. With the interactive map in my electronic journal I knew I could find my way back to Hell’s Gate but going on foot would make the journey longer and much more dangerous.

I looked down at Tanhì, who was happily licking my arm clean of any dried sweat—yeah it was gross but she looked so content doing it that I couldn’t find it in me to push her away.

“Max is going to _love _you,” I murmured, using my free hand to grab my braid and offer _tsaheylu_. My baby accepted without hesitation and with a shiver I felt her consciousness meld with mine. Gently, I began to give her images of Hell’s Gate; brief moments of experiencing the the sharp green scent of the Avatar Training Ground, the clean smell of Max’s lab coat detergent and the fondness of his smile whenever he talked about the pet cat he had left behind on Earth. Tanhì clung to the strange sight of his thick beard and the odd darkness of his eyes, confused as to why his skin was _brown_.

I laughed. “He’s human, sweet-pea. You’ll have to be very gentle with him when you guys meet, okay?”

Tanhì made a low chuffing sound in response, her amber eyes bright as she butted her forehead against my arm—an unspoken request for more colorful images. Smiling, I settled more comfortably into my spot and started again, this time intermixing memories of Norm and Jake in their Avatar forms into the exchange. Unsurprisingly she found Jake the most interesting; she was fascinated by the fearless, untamed energy that so closely resembled her own. In comparison Norm received only the briefest observation from her but she _did _seem to enjoy the strange lilt of his awkward laughter and let out a pleased hum at the memory of Norm beaming in a way only Norm could whenever he got the chance to talk about the Na’vi culture.

“I miss them,” I murmured once the memories ran their course. Tanhì growled under her breath at the surge of sadness and reached up to nuzzle her head under my chin, careful to avoid the still tender cut. Her mind reached into mine and pulled forward the image of Jake once again, her young mind curious and probing at feelings I had long since put in their place.

My cheeks felt overly hot as I let out a startled laugh. “Okay, no, we are _not _talking about this.”

But when I tried to show her images of Hell’s Gate again she did the same thing, focusing on the earlier memories of human Jake and I sitting across from each other at the cafeteria and nudging at the unexpected tickle of warmth in my stomach when he grinned at me for the first time. His eyes had been blue, then, but the effect of his smile was the same whether in human or Na’vi form.

Frowning, I firmly pushed her mind away from mine and disconnected our queue strands. She whined at the lack of connection but settled down once I started scratching at her favorite spot—just behind her sharp sensory quills.

My heart was pounding in my chest at the quick work Tanhì had made of my human memories and the shocking insightfulness of her sharp, animal mind. The probing had been almost _accusatory_, accompanied by brief images of Kinak and the strength of his voice and the way his eyes lingered on me even when I wasn’t looking.

“Let’s just focus on getting through this alive, okay?” I muttered to her under my breath before leaning my head back and closing my eyes.

When my brain finally slowed down enough for sleep to come I dreamed of the hours I had spent watching over Jake as he rested his human body in between mind-transfer shifts and how it felt the first time—and every time after—he reached out to take my hand in one of his before falling asleep.

In my dreams, I reached for a hand of my own to hold. The last thing I remembered before being shaken awake by Sänume was the feeling of a masculine, distinctly four-fingered hand closing around mine and the instant wave of calm that washed through me when it did.


	11. The Trial

Lielu tried to offer me water but I waved it away, knowing that anything I put in my stomach would come right back up. At my side, Tanhì whined in distaste at the amount of nervous energy in the large gathering area; her amber eyes never ceased in their scanning of the room.

Every single Tipani adult was seated around the slab of stone that served as a stage of sorts—the adolescents had been charged with caring for the young ones in one of the upper levels, far enough to be out of earshot. Dozens of large torches were stationed around the stage and burned so brightly that the entire space was comfortably illuminated. Sänume quietly spoke with her Council on one end while Winan and I stood opposite them. The moment Lielu arrived she had silently situated herself in the large space between us; blatantly ignoring me when I told her she didn’t need to stand right beside me.

I hadn’t seen Kinak yet but that didn’t surprise me. I had broken his _nose_—why would he be running back to support me after that?

Lielu caught me searching the crowd, uncannily observant just like the rest of her family.

“He will be here, Sara,” she whispered reassuringly. 

“It doesn’t matter if he is or isn’t,” I said dismissively, my wounded pride a clawing thing inside of my chest.

Lielu let out an angry hiss. “You two are like _children_,” she whispered accusingly. In response I smacked her solidly on the thigh with my tail.

Ignoring her glare, I replied, “Kinak made it clear what he thinks of me—”

Lielu’s eyes flashed. “—and _you _ran away instead of confronting the problem!” 

My jaw dropped at the harshness of her tone but before I could think of a response Sänume stepped forward and held her hands up to quiet the Clan. It took mere seconds for Hometree to be still as death and immediately I wished people would start talking again; the silence was worse than the chatter had been.

Sänume remained quiet even after silence had been achieved. Her sharp gaze lingered on Winan and myself before returning to her people.

“The Trial has begun, my brothers and sisters,” she began. “Tonight we will hear both sides to this tale and, Eywa willing, the truth will come to light. Are we prepared to hear them?”

The Clan clapped once in perfect unison—a crazy achievement considering that there were hundreds of people and they hadn’t done a count down. Sänume nodded in agreement and gestured for me to step forward.

Trying to keep the terror out of my expression, I gave Tanhì’s head one last pat before stepping forward to stand beside the Clan Leader.

For a moment I was a child again, dressed in a scratchy princess gown and staring numbly out at the audience of parents that had come to see the elementary school play. The name of the play escaped me but the brightness of the stage light—in this case it was firelight—on my face and the creeping terror upon realizing that there were hundreds of pairs of eyes on me was something I would never forget.

Blinking to clear the image from my mind, I cleared my throat and lifted my chin to better meet the gazes of the Tipani Clan seated before me.

“Winan attacked me as I was coming down from the upper levels,” I explained, swallowing hard to keep the nervousness from affecting my ability to speak. “She held a knife to my throat and began to yell that ‘it’ was going to kill her. For a moment I thought she meant _me _but when I moved and the knife cut my neck—” At that, I pushed my hair away so that the still-painful wound was visible. “—she tried to wipe away the blood and hide the wound. It was then that I realized that ‘it’ was Tanhì, that Winan _wanted _Tanhì to attack her so she could prove that she is too dangerous to live in Hometree. I tried to yell for Tanhì to stop but Winan covered my mouth before I could. That’s why Tanhì did what she did—she was just trying to protect me.”

Sänume moved to stand beside me, her expression carefully neutral.

“Is there anyone who would speak in support of Sara’s words?”

Almost before Sänume had finished speaking, a familiar figure stood up in the crowd. When I squinted past the bright orange light of the fires I recognized the tattooed face of Etae.  
  
“The palulukan is not a threat and should be allowed to stay,” he stated. 

He then met my gaze and put a hand over his heart in a purposeful gesture that I didn’t quite understand but the rest of the Na’vi very much did—they immediately began to whisper and murmur amongst themselves.

Etae cleared his throat. “My daughter and I were walking down to our home when Renali wandered too close to the stairway edge and fell. Tanhì and Sara were walking up at the same moment and the palulukan _ran _to catch Renali and return her to safe ground. I wouldn’t have thought it possible if I hadn’t seen the miracle with my own two eyes. My daughter would be dead if not for Tanhì and for that, she and Sara will always have a place at my fire,” the healer finished, nodding in my direction before sitting back down.

“And now,” Sänume said loudly, interrupting the lingering whispers of the crowd. “Winan will be allowed to speak.”

All eyes went to the woman in question as she moved forward. Her shoulder was covered in delicate plant-fiber bandages and every movement looked like it hurt but she didn’t let the pain show on her face. I braced myself, waiting for the lies, unable to keep from flinching when an unexpected touch came—Lielu slipping her hand into mine.

My friend’s show of support, even in the wake of her harsh words, made my throat clench with emotion.

Winan looked to me, then. Just as before, the moment her piercing gaze met mine I couldn’t look away, couldn’t even _try_to look away. The Na’vi were unafraid of eye contact as a whole but the unique green color made her stare even more intense.

“Everything the dreamwalker has said is true.”

My eyes widened as the words slowly sank in, so sluggishly that it was as if my brain was having trouble processing, and at the same time I felt the world around me _explode._

Almost every single Tipani jumped to their feet and began shouting. I saw more than a few ugly gestures and words thrown in Winan’s direction and felt the most bizarre urge to step in front of the woman in an effort to shield her. Her face went blank as a result of her clan mates’ words and the shift in expression took_years_off of her. The clear youth in her features made me wonder how her son had died—he wouldn’t have been old enough to fight in the Battle, considering that Winan herself looked to be around thirty. 

Sänume’s cry for order rose above the chaos but it still took a good minute or two for silence to return and even_then_there were murmurs every now and then. Lielu’s hand tightened around mine as if to ground herself and I gripped back just as tightly. 

The Clan Leader took a deep breath before turning to Winan.“You admit to abusing the bond between Sara and the palulukan for your own gain? You admit to trying to trick us into believing that Sara could not control Tanhì and therefore should not be allowed to remain?” she asked.

Winan's mouth tightened with every word but the look in her green eyes—I now recognized it as resignation—remained the same.

“Yes.”

Cries of outrage erupted from the Clan and I looked around in shock; never would I have expected that the Tipani would ever speak against one of their own. But I supposed that even _they _couldn’t argue against Winan willingly admitting her guilt.

Speaking of that: why Winan had come clean? What had changed so drastically in the few hours between the attack and the Trial?

Tanhì moved her head so it rested just under my hand. I glanced down at her, frowning when, for some strange reason, I began remembering the feel of her animal mind as I perused memories of Hell’s Gate and times spent with Jake and Norm. Looking away from her did nothing to lessen the strength of those memories and the stinging ache of homesickness that accompanied them.

Sänume’s eyes closed for a brief moment. “Then it is decided,” she said quietly as she moved to address the Clan:   
  
“I, Olo’eyktan of the Tipani Clan, sentence Winan to exile. She will be given until after Txampfya to heal and pack her belongings but then she must leave Hometree and never return. We will tell the other clans of—”

“_No_!” came tumbling out of me before I could think to restrain myself. Sänume radiated irritation at being interrupted but something in my expression must have mollified her because she merely let out a long sigh before looking to me.

“I will forgive you speaking out of turn because you are still new to our ways, but this is not the time to—”

“I’m sorry, but…” I interjected, ignoring the shocked hush that followed me interrupting Sänume for a second time and scrambling for my next words. “…but as the person who was attacked, I should have a say in what happens to my attacker. Please, Olo’eyktan,” I added, hoping the woman trusted me enough to give me a chance to speak. 

Sänume sent a look to her Council, waiting until all four members nodded before giving me a curt nod. A shuddering gasp of relief left me at that and I tentatively stepped towards Winan. The woman’s posture stiffened but she didn’t look away from me, not for one second. The trembling of her ears was the only sign that she wasn’t entirely in control; the sight filled me with pity because even when faced with exile she was trying so hard to be _strong_.

One of the first things I had learned upon arriving at Hometree a little over two months ago was that the Tipani Clan was both the largest and most ruthless of the Na’vi Clans. Their specialty was armor and combat and it showed in the harsh punishments and often-dangerous teaching methods. The Na’vi as a people were tough but the Tipani took it to another level and it became even clearer as I witnessed Winan’s unwillingness to show fear or grief at being banished from her home.

A wave of calm swept over me, then, as my decision became clear.

“I agree that Winan should be exiled from Tipani territory—” I began. “—but I don’t think it is right to tell the other Clans of her actions. It will only continue the cycle of pain and Winan deserves to _heal_, just as all of you do after the Great Battle. So—”

I paused, then, taking a deep breath and sending a silent plea to all known deities to not let this bite me in the ass before continuing: 

“—I say that she should be sent to live with the Omaticaya. They have two dreamwalkers among them and are in close contact with the humans at Hell’s Gate, which should give Winan a chance to see that humans are capable of _good_, too.” 

I was close enough to Winan that I could hear the sharpness of her breathing and see the shocked widening of her eyes. I didn’t look at her for too long, though, instead focusing on meeting the gazes of Sänume and her Council.

Sänume wasn’t smiling but there was a glint of something akin to pride in her eyes. Her shoulders relaxed in a way that they hadn’t since coming upon the scene of Winan’s attack.

“Does anyone object to this punishment?” she asked, the feathers on her tunic rustling as she spoke. I held my breath as the silence dragged on and on, broken only by the rapid beating of my heart and the harsh breathing of Winan beside me.

Not one hand rose; not even those of some of the older members of the Clan that I knew for a fact didn’t approve of my presence in Hometree. Sänume waited a full thirty seconds longer—I knew the exact time because I was slowly counting in my head, desperate to keep my emotions in check—before clapping once. The rest of the Clan responded with two claps and a shivering energy slipped down my spine at the precision of the sounds.

Sänume nodded in satisfaction. “Then it is decided: Winan will remain with the healers’ until after Txampfya. This Trial is now done,” she said—a clear and irrefutable dismissal. The Clan quietly began to disperse and soon the main meeting area was almost empty.

I still couldn’t quite feel my legs, so shaken was I by the rapid progression of events, and my focus returned to Winan despite my attempts to look at literally _anything _else. The woman didn’t speak to me as she shuffled by but I braced myself for harsh words all the same. It wasn’t until she disappeared—shadowed by several healers—behind the colorful tapestry that separated the healing space from the rest of Hometree that I felt the coiled tension at the base of my spine begin to unravel.

Sänume’s back was to Lielu and I as she said her farewells to the last of her Council and a frown creased her brow when she turned to face us; the firelight cast harsh shadows across her face.

“Go to sleep, both of you,” she ordered, albeit gently. 

I worried my lower lip between my teeth. “Sänume, I’m sorry for speaking up like that. I just didn’t want…I…”

I trailed off, unable to put into words what I wanted to say because there wasn’t a specific _reason _that I didn’t want Winan shunned by all the Clans. The more I thought about it, in fact, the more I wondered at myself because the woman had wanted me _dead._

Why couldn’t I let Tipani justice be upheld? Why couldn’t I just let things _be_?

The Clan Leader’s eyes softened. “It is not the Tipani way to show mercy, Sara.”

My ears pinned back in guilt. “I’m sorr—” I began, but Sänume smoothly cut me off with:

“But perhaps it _should _be.”

And with that the woman was gone, striding to her tent and vanishing behind the front door flap. The moment the door closed, Lielu let out a huge sigh of relief.

“The Great Mother must have sent Winan a message and urged her to confess,” she breathed. Her eyes closing briefly in what I assumed was a silent prayer of gratitude. I, on the other hand, wasn’t quite so sure.

“I didn’t think Eywa worked like that,” I admitted. “Don’t we need direct connection through _tsaheylu _to hear her?”

Thankfully, Lielu didn’t seem offended by my clear doubt.

“It isn’t unheard of for the Mother to send us strong feelings or visions outside of _tsaheylu _if She feels the situation calls for it,” she reasoned as the two of us began to walk towards the hammocks.

Tanhì stayed close to my side but seemed reluctant to go deeper into Hometree. After a few moments of this I crouched down to rub at her neck. Lielu sent me a look, the question unspoken but still clear.

“Tanhì’s unsettled,” I explained. “I think she wants to go outside for a bit,” I continued quietly after a moment of watching my baby fidget and turn her head to sniff in the direction of Hometree’s entrance. Lielu looked like she wanted to argue but nodded when Tanhì licked her hand.

The moment I patted Tanhì’s head to let her know that she could head out the young thanator bounded ahead, past the stone stage and towards the pale green lamps that hung on either side of the entrance. I followed at a slower pace and smiled at the slight wiggle to her hips as she sniffed the air.

“What is it, sweet-pea?” I asked under my breath, scanning the jungle for myself. The trees were aglow with bioluminescence and from within came the sounds of insects and small nocturnal creatures but nothing struck me as out of the ordinary.

Tanhì’s ears perked up and her large head tilted around so that she could stare at something behind me. I turned to investigate and my entire body immediately tensed.

Kinak was sitting on the ground just beside the entrance, hidden from those inside but close enough that in an instant I knew that this was where he had been during the Trial—that explained why I hadn’t seen him.

Tanhì whined but didn’t move from my side; she was waiting for my permission to approach, I realized. I hurried to give her the signal and watched with a tight throat as my baby eagerly trotted over to sit beside him.

I shifted my weight, uncomfortable because Kinak wouldn’t stop _staring _at me, not even when Tanhì dropped her head onto his lap.

What did he want me to say? Did he even _want _me to say anything?

His nose looked horrible—bruised and swollen—and the sight made me feel vaguely nauseous instead of smug. I tangled my fingers together and firmly shoved away the urge to walk right back into Hometree because Lielu was right—me running away wouldn’t solve a damn thing. 

Kinak let out a heavy exhale, finally breaking eye contact and tentatively stroking his fingers along Tanhì’s neck. The thanator growled in delight at finally being acknowledged and nuzzled into his stomach.

I cleared my throat. “Kinak, I—”

Kinak’s voice cut me off, and the shock of hearing him speak in _English _was enough to make me forget anything that I might have said. 

“You deny way of Eywa and take palulukan cub as own when even _scientist _would let cub die with mother. Now, you win Trial but _still _choose to make better the life of woman that tried to _kill _you.”

I huffed at his frustrated tone, crossing my arms over my chest and glaring down at him.

“So you’re mad at me for not being a typical scientist _and _for not being a typical Tipani?” I replied in English. Kinak’s fangs showed as he growled but I didn’t back down. “I’m human—being unpredictable is part of the job description.” 

Kinak’s ears pinned against his head. “All that no happen because you be _human_.”

My tail lashed behind my ankles as I snarled, “Just because _you’re_ embarrassed of my humanity doesn’t mean that—”

Kinak let out a low curse and gingerly pushed Tanhì’s head off his lap before clambering to his feet.

“I no feel shame that you be human before!” he declared through gritted teeth. 

A choked laugh escaped me at that. “Then _why _would you say those things to me? Why would you say that it’s in a scientist’s nature to not care about anything unless it benefits them? Didn’t you realize how much that would _hurt _me?”

Turning away was all I could do. I stared out into the glowing forest, fighting back tears and wishing that I hadn’t followed Tanhì outside in the first place.

“When I spoke about scientists,” Kinak said in Na’vi, his voice low and so achingly _quiet _that it made my lips tremble with the effort of remaining silent. “I was using Grace’s words, not my own, and that was wrong. I did not think that it would hurt you because I can’t remember the last time I’ve thought of you as one of them—as _human_.”

“But I _am _one of them!” I hissed as I turned to face him. “And that’s never going to change, no matter what my body looks like, because I’m _proud _of where I came from!”

There it was—the unspoken truth that I had been pushing aside for weeks and weeks in the vain hope that maybe Kinak and Lielu would overlook my humanity, that maybe the Clan would eventually _forget _and accept me in the way I so desperately craved.

Slowly, very slowly, Kinak held out his hand—a clear request. I scowled up at him, stubborn, but the gentleness in his eyes broke my resistance in an embarrassingly short amount of time.

“You are also one of _us_,” Kinak said quietly when I put my hand in his, eyes downcast as they followed his finger’s path in tracing the bioluminescent markings along my wrist. “And yet you keep pulling away and refusing to admit that you belong _here _as much as you once belonged at Hell’s Gate.”

I sucked in a pained breath at the blunt words but couldn’t find the strength to deny them. Kinak didn’t push me to speak, busy investigating the extra finger I had. The moment he touched the appendage, however, I felt a rush of shame and roughly yanked my hand away. His eyes narrowed and he took a bold step closer, not quite close enough to touch but enough for his scent to stubbornly linger in my nose.

“This is not a thing of science, Sara,” he said roughly. “It is something you must feel, something you must _choose_.”

His gaze flitted down to my mouth, almost unconsciously, before returning to meet mine and in that split second the craziest image of Kinak leaning down and kissing me entered my brain. He certainly was _close_ enough and I became achingly aware that my Na’vi body wasn’t exactly _put off _by the idea of—

I blinked and the moment was over; he had already stepped back and Tanhì was pushing her body against my leg in search of affection. Kinak looked at me for several more seconds, eyes flicking back and forth as if searching for something.

Then, without any warning, he turned and marched back into Hometree, leaving me to stare dumbly after him with only Tanhì and the nocturnal sounds of the bioluminescent forest to keep me company.


	12. Txampfya

The morning of the Txampfya dawned, promising to be bright and glorious as I finished my electronic journal entry—I had woken earlier than the others so I could type one last message before heading out. Sucking in a sharp breath, I closed the laptop and leaned back against the rough bark of Hometree for a moment before standing and making my way to the base level.

I suppose that I could lie and say that my desire to leave one last journal entry was for the collection of knowledge and to provide a proper “before and after” perspective, but the truth?

The truth was that I was scared—scared that I wouldn’t live to tell the “after” part.

Two months of training wasn’t nearly enough to get me ready to take on a goddamn _banshee_. Hell, even_ Jake_ had had more time before completing the test and he had had_ years_ of military training before even stepping foot on Pandora. Part of me wondered if I should go to Citra right then and beg to take the test in a year with the younger Tipani hopefuls, but I knew better than to seriously consider it.

The Tipani valued strength above all else; if I wanted to prove that I deserved a place among them, especially as a dreamwalker, I needed to show that I wasn’t afraid to put my life on the line.

I glanced up at the shelf next to my hammock as I slid the thin laptop back into its padded case. The framed picture of Mom, Dad and I standing in front of the Pandora shuttle was carefully propped there. With a small sigh I reached up and touched the proud smiles of my parents.

“Maybe I’ll be seeing you guys soon,” I whispered, so caught up in examining the familiar lines and creases of their faces that Tanhì appearing at my side made me jump. My hand flung out to catch myself and knocked the picture and one of the thick botany tomes I had taken from Hell’s Gate right off of the shelf. I hurried to pick up the frame—durable, thank God, and therefore undamaged—as I swore under my breath and pushed Tanhì’s inquisitive snout away. After making sure the picture was safely back on the shelf I bent to pick up the book, only to pause as I reached for it.

The small laminated corner of a picture poked out from between the text’s waterproof pages.

Frowning, I pulled the photograph out from its place. The moment I did, my chest tightened painfully because suddenly I remembered why I had hidden it away in the first place.

_“Picture time!” an inebriated Norm crowed, holding up one the handheld cameras that were usually reserved for fieldwork. Jake put down his plastic cup filled with cheap military-grade beer, unusually compliant, and I very nearly spilled my drink when he suddenly reached over and pulled me into his lap. _

_I refused to acknowledge the rush of heat that went straight to my lower abdomen in response to the casual display of strength and settled for struggling to free myself instead. _

_“Hey—”_

_Jake kept me firmly in place, one of his hands hooking around my outer thigh and the other sliding up my back. I went quiet at the intimate touch, feeling my cheeks burn but trying my best to ignore it. _

_He’s drunk_ _, I reasoned, _ _That’s the only reason he’s touching you like this. _

_“You scared to have our friendship documented, Mason?” Jake challenged, his blue eyes sparkling when I bristled at the insinuation. _

_“Bold of you to assume that we’re _ _friends_ _, Sully,” I shot back, the alcohol making me brave. The outer corners of Jake’s eyes crinkled in the way that I secretly adored and I couldn’t help but grin back, the warmth of his hands and his smile making it impossible to maintain the façade. _

_The camera flashed—_

I shoved the picture back into the book and slammed it shut, unsettled by the unexpected depth of feeling that the memory caused—even after all that had happened since then.

Shaking my head, I gave Tanhì one last hug around the neck along with a gentle but firm command to stay put. Before I could chase away the impulse, I carefully extracted the picture of my parents out of the frame and tucked into my waist-pouch.

Even with my delay in putting away the electronic journal I was still the first to arrive at the meeting place. Citra stood at the edge of the forest with her back to Hometree, staring up at the slowly lightening sky with her arms crossed. She didn’t make any acknowledgment of me when I reached her and I was grateful for that—my thoughts were too tumultuous for me to make pointless small talk. Seven _pa’li _stood in a loose huddle nearby; their occasional snorts and stomps of feet broke the silence that always came in the hour before dawn, a silence that Dr. Augustine had nicknamed the ‘changing of the guard’.

I found my preferred _pa’li_ within seconds—she had a large, distinctive stripe of dark blue on her muzzle, not to mention her ears perked up when I approached.

“Hello to you too, Jo,” I murmured as the creature nuzzled at my hands.

The arrival of the others was a quiet affair but compared to the stillness of just Citra and I it was a jarring thing. Teril and Sana led the group; both were outwardly calm but I knew them well enough by now to see the nervousness hiding just under the surface. Akwei and Ninoa were next, closely followed by a stone-faced Kinak.

I hadn’t seen Kinak since our conversation outside of Hometree and it wasn’t until he met my eye that I realized how much I had missed him.

Teril nodded in greeting as she moved to the _pa'li_ on Jo’s right. I nodded back, turning just in time to receive the tight hug of an uncharacteristically solemn Sana—she was a touchy person even by Na’vi standards and very nearly inappropriate by Tipani ones, but I didn’t mind.

Just then, the sun broke over the tree line and filled the small clearing with intense golden-pink light. Citra’s bioluminescent marks pulsed in greeting for each of us.

“It is time,” she said, prompting the rest to approach their mounts and make _tsaheylu_.

As always, Jo’s mind was calm and steady, so unlike Tanhì’s—perhaps that was what had drawn me to the mare in the first place. The bond wasn’t especially deep or profound but there was a spark of genuine affection and compatibility there that made riding her much more enjoyable than riding other pa’li.

The next few hours passed quickly as we took the now-familiar route to the eastern Tipani village. We would leave our pa’li there and hike the rest of the way to the ocean caves—the official starting point of the Txampfya. Kinak rode ahead without sparing me a glance, settling beside Ninoa and his mother while I tried to pretend that the sting of rejection didn’t hurt quite as much as it did.

It wasn’t until we began the hike that my mood was broken.

“How long are you and Kinak going to ignore each other?” Teril grumbled to me as we fell into pairs along the narrow path. I frowned at the blunt question and focused straight ahead, pushing my long braids over my shoulder rather than meet her eye.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said shortly, at which Akwei—emboldened by the nervous energy in the air, I supposed—turned his head from where he walked ahead of us with Sana and sent me an incredulous look.

“Kinak’s answer was the same!” he exclaimed.

My teeth ground together as irritation surged. “Okay, this conversation needs to_ end_—”

_“All we’re saying—” Teril interrupted. “—is that a __fyeynìsyor_ would help,” she declared, grinning when the other two nodded in clear agreement. I didn’t respond, too busy trying to figure out what ‘fyeynìsyor’ meant. The word had elements of other concepts I knew but the way Teril was using it made me think that it was a colloquial term.

Before I could ask, we rounded a large outcrop of stone and my heart leapt in my throat at what awaited us on the other side.

It was the _ocean_—not the brown, polluted ocean of Earth that had been my neighbor growing up but an expansive, gloriously _blue_ one. It stretched out as far as the eye could see, shining bright and perfect under the afternoon sun. The pure white sand of the beach ahead was scattered with gleaming gray-purple stones as well as brilliantly colored shells. The smell hit me in a rush and I sucked in a huge breath to better appreciate the delightful tang of salt and wetness. 

I had seen pictures and read accounts of the beauty once found in Earth’s oceans but never in my wildest dreams had I imagined that I would see it for myself. The one in front of me wasn’t _my_ planet’s ocean, sure, but it was still an _ocean_.

Heart thudding in my chest and the Txampfya promptly forgotten, I ran past the others down the slope and onto the beach. A wild, unexpected burst of laughter burst out of me at the silky smooth feel of the sand under my feet and between my fingers when I bent down to touch it.

The crashing sound of a small wave caught my attention and I scrambled to the water’s edge, stopping just as I was about to step into it. On Earth there were walls to prevent citizens from coming into contact with the ocean so as to prevent contamination from spreading into the cities. It didn’t stop us from learning to swim—every child was required to learn regardless of proximity to water—but it did prevent exploration of the beaches.

I knew, of course, that this water wasn’t polluted and that I wasn’t going to get in trouble but there was still this moment of hesitation, of _fear_.

And then, the tide came in higher than I expected and a small crest of cold water soaked me from the waist downward. My cheeks were beginning to hurt with how much I was smiling but I didn’t care. I began to run again, this time in ankle-deep water, skipping and laughing and turning my face up to the sky as if to absorb every ray of sunlight as it came down.

The sound of splashing of water behind me caught my attention. When I glanced around I was shocked to see the entire group running after me. On a whim, I shouted:

“I guess I’m the fastest, then!”

That was all it took for the race to begin. I had a head start but they were all born-Na’vi and so it only took them a few seconds to begin closing the distance. I knew from a scientific perspective that my human-Na’vi hybrid body would never be as slender and nimble as Na’vi ones—my muscles and bones were slightly bulkier due to the added human genes—but that wasn’t about to stop me from trying.

My breaths came faster and faster as I put all of my effort into it instead of the leisurely jog from before, and to my surprise I was maintaining a pretty good lead. Teasing words and mock-angry jeers came from behind me but I didn’t waste the energy by turning around to see who was saying what; my eye was on the caves a few hundred meters ahead.

Just a bit further—

A very muscular, very _familiar_ arm snaked around my waist and yanked me into the air, spinning me around, and a startled shriek left my throat at the sudden contact. I craned my head around to yell at Kinak but one look at his face—crystal clear amidst the hazy images of the others running past us—made the words die in my throat.

He was_ laughing_; not his usual chuckle or snort of amusement but loud laughter that made his whole body shake. The lovely sound rose above the hiss of the tide and for a moment all I could do was _listen_.

Ninoa’s shouts effectively distracted me, and without needing prompting Kinak let me slide to the ground so the both of us could look over at the others. Teril had picked Ninoa up and was trying her very hardest to dump her into the water but the shorter of the two was clinging with all of her strength and cackling at Teril’s steadily increasing frustration. Akwei and Sana were relaxed, sitting in the warm sand and laughing at Teril’s efforts while they admired the colorful shells around their feet. Citra had seated herself on one of the wind-roughened boulders that guarded the entrance to the caves and was watching the rest with an expression that was eerily similar to the one Dr. Augustine had worn in her rare moments of contentment.

Swallowing hard to dispel the lump that formed in my throat at the sight, I looked back up at Kinak. The earnestness of his gaze made his words that night outside of Hometree spring to the forefront of my thoughts:

_“This is not a thing of science, Sara. It is something you must feel, something you must _choose_.” _

That moment continued to nag at me, even after several days, because how could he expect me to choose between two equally valid parts of myself?

The vast majority of the Avatar drivers had come to Pandora without a return ticket; had chosen to fully set aside their human roots and throw themselves into a new culture and life. In stark contrast, eighteen-year-old Sara had fully expected to make the journey back to Earth after four years, had envisioned getting married and spending long nights telling her children stories of an alien world with glowing plants and untainted skies.

“We should head over,” I said abruptly, tilting my head in the direction of the others rather than risk the stillness growing wide enough for me to do something stupid—like blurt out all the confusing thoughts and desires that had been running endless loops in my brain since our talk outside of Hometree.

Without a word Kinak fell into step beside me and we walked in not-quite-comfortable silence towards the caves. Teril had given up trying to drop Ninoa alone into the water and had elected to sacrifice herself as well—both of them were wet and laughing as they emerged from the waves. Akwei spotted us approaching and let out a short, bird-like sound in greeting; a strange Na’vi custom that I still wasn’t quite used to but one that Jake and Norm had picked up with ease. It felt so _odd_ to not use words but I supposed that the Clans were so in-sync with the habits and communication styles of the natural world around them that incorporating animal-calls into their language wasn’t all that strange.

Citra hopped down from the rock once we reached the group and the playful mood sobered immediately. For a brief moment I had forgotten the Txampfya completely, had been so swept up in the sight of the ocean and the bittersweet memories of my home planet that everything else had seemed unimportant. Part of me was surprised that she had let us take a break at all, that she had let the others play around in the water and enjoy the sunlight as if we were simply a group of friends spending the day at the beach instead of a group of warrior-hopefuls on their way to a banshee nest.

“Through this cave—” she said, gesturing to the cave opening directly behind her. “—you will find a pool. The only safe passage to the ikran nests is through it—do not stray from the lights.”

As she spoke, she reached for a pouch tied to her belt and reached inside—her fingers came out covered in a thick, vibrant green paste.

“Before the Txampfya, you must be marked,” was her explanation, and I swallowed hard.

There had been mention of this, in both the training yard as well as my nightly meetings with Sänume, but I hadn’t thought much of it beyond comparing it to the uncomfortable team-building exercises Dr. Augustine had tried to make us do for a total of ten minutes before losing patience and scrapping the idea.

_One mark from each of the warriors who trained by your side,_ Sänume had said one night, her voice thick with nostalgia and a hint of melancholy. _No combination of marks is ever the same, washed away just as quickly as they are placed—only seen by those who share Txampfya with you. _

Citra began, moving towards Akwei and pressing her paste-coated thumb against the center of his forehead. It left a crisp oval of color on his skin.

“For your lightness of spirit,” she murmured, just loud enough for all of us to hear. She stepped back but kept the pouch extended—a clear invitation for the next person to go. Akwei, usually so unaffected and cheerful, looked as nervous as I had ever seen him and I didn’t blame him one bit. It wasn’t easy to be the center of attention, especially when the attention included receiving praise.

To my surprise, Ninoa went next. After dipping a single finger in the paste she approached him.

“For your strength,” she said softly. With that, she drew a graceful wave pattern on the side of his partially shaven head. Akwei’s eyes lingered on her when she retreated to her place in the circle and the curious intensity in his gaze raised all _sorts_ of questions.

Teril went next—“For the joy you bring.”

Then Sana—“For our talks.”

Kinak—“For your quickness.”

When my turn came, Akwei smiled reassuringly at me. It gave me the courage to draw a small zig-zag on his cheek and say: “For your kindness.”

And so it went, each of us stepping forward and marking each other when the time came. Teril went after Akwei, and her marks came together to form a beautiful but sharp combination of lines.

(“For your honesty,” I told her as I drew my mark on her chin.)

Sana was next, and the finished marking was all circles and other smooth shapes.

(I said, “For your gentleness,” as I drew a circle around her eye.)

Then came Ninoa.

(Her eyes were guarded when I approached, no doubt remembering the hostility that had been present between us since the beginning. It had softened as time went on, but the initial moments couldn’t be erased so easily.

“For your loyalty,” I said gently, and her entire face smoothed out in shock as I drew a triangle on her forehead.)

Kinak was next, his markings a strange but still striking tangle of curves and lines.

(“For finding me,” I whispered to him, reaching up to draw a straight line down the bridge of his nose. The look in his golden eyes let me know that he knew exactly what I meant with my words, was remembering our first meeting in the forest after the Battle. His face remained inscrutable as I stepped back.)

I was last in line and in a moment of panic I wondered if I should suggest that we skip me—I wasn’t fully Na’vi, so maybe I could get away with not participating in _all_ of the rituals?

Citra moved forward before I could, her mark a gentle but firm line down my lips as if anticipating me speaking up.

“For your discipline.”

Akwei moved forward before I could analyze what the woman’s words meant. His eyes danced as he drew a line across the bridge of my nose.

“For always having time to share knowledge,” he said, his tail flicking in thanks. I let out a quiet chuckle at that, remembering his tentative request for me to teach him some English and the long, laughter-filled afternoons spent doing just that.

Sana bounced forward. “For your smile.”

“For never giving up,” Teril murmured as she drew an arch over my left eye.

Ninoa hesitated for several moments before drawing a circle around the scabbing cut on my neck. “For your compassion.” My brow furrowed and the shorter woman’s lips quirked into an almost-smile. “Winan is my cousin,” she quietly explained.

She stepped back before I could react and suddenly Kinak was standing in front of me. All other thoughts promptly escaped my brain because had he always been so _big_? He wasn’t all that much taller than me thanks to my Avatar’s height being above average but he still somehow managed to make me feel small.

He dipped his fingers into the paste, leaving only his thumb free of color, and reached out to gently trace them along my jawline. I tensed at the touch because it felt intimate in a way that none of the other marks had.

“For being human,” he said.

My entire body froze, the sound of his words thudding alongside my pulse. I wondered, for a moment, if I had misheard him, but one quick look around the circle made it very clear that I hadn’t.

The sound of wave crashing against the rocks to our left made me jump, breaking the moment cleanly in two, and Citra waited for the hiss of the water returning to the sea to fade before speaking.

“I will be waiting at the entrance to the nest,” she said quietly, gesturing for us to enter the cave. There was a moment of awkwardness as we all exchanged looks, silently asking who would go in first. It didn’t surprise me at all when Ninoa set her shoulders and made her way inside without a glance backward to see if we were following. Sana darted in after her sister, playfully flicking Akwei’s leg with her tail as she went. Chuckling weakly, he followed her, and Teril rolled her eyes before doing the same.

“You didn’t have to say that,” I blurted out to Kinak in English the moment we were alone. “I didn’t talk about being human the other night to try and convince you to feel differently about them.”

“I said it because it is one of the things I admire most about you, Sara,” Kinak said shortly in Na’vi. “Even if you left us tomorrow and returned to the human camp for good, I would still fight for that part of you—would still fight for _you_.”

Without another word he pushed past me and entered the cave. I stared after him, blinking rapidly to clear the sudden surge of tears that threatened. The high-stress trial was definitely to blame, that and the seeing the ocean and thinking of my home planet for the first time in months. There was no other explanation for the heavy ache in my chest—

“For all of your strengths—” Citra commented. “—you’re still so stupid, sometimes.”

“Is there a_ point_ somewhere in there?” I snapped. The older woman snorted at my tone before reaching forward to gently tuck a few errant braids behind my ears. Her gaze softened but only for a moment. Without warning she stepped back in order to call for her banshee—the creature had been following us all morning and quickly flew down from its resting place on the upper ledges of the cliffs.

“You’ve proven time and time again that you’re eager to learn and keep an open mind to better fit in with the Tipani,” Citra said. “Why are you so surprised to find that most are willing to do the same for you?”

The woman turned away before I could think of a proper retort. After waiting for her to mount, the banshee carried her up over the top of the caves and out of sight. The rasp of the waves against the shore was the only thing I could focus on for several seconds. Then I registered the itch of the green paste drying on my cheeks and remembered that I had places to be. Scowling at my absentmindedness and determined not to be distracted any further, I hurried into the cave, pausing at the entrance to let my eyes adjust to the dim lighting.

The cave was much shallower than I had imagined and unusually dark save for the brightly lit pool in the center of the floor. I was so used to bioluminescence in times of darkness that to not have the comforting glow all around me was a bit unnerving and urged me to quicken my pace towards the water. Unsurprisingly, the others had gone ahead without me, and part of me was grateful to have this moment alone. The pool was beautiful, glowing from within thanks to the green-blue algae and giant, glowing pink sea anemone lining the sides.

I recognized several uncommon sea-grass species and cringed at myself when my hand instinctively went for my pack to grab my research notebook—only to grab around nothing but air because I was in the middle of a _fairly_ important rite of passage.

“I’ll be back, don’t you worry,” I promised the grasses, doubly grateful no one was there to witness my habit of talking to plants as if they were capable of responding. After securing my belt and the items attached to it, I took a deep breath and jumped feet first into the water.

The first sensation was shock because the water was _warm_—how was that possible with it being so close to the ocean?

The second was the telltale prickle of warning because I wasn’t _alone_ in this pool.

I opened my eyes, expecting to feel the sting of salt but surprised to find it absent. As Citra had mentioned, there were a series of floating lights—each one enclosed in a translucent sac that looked to be Na’vi-made—on either side of me, creating a sort of path that led deeper into the cave’s enormous underwater section. What made me shriek involuntarily and release a few precious moments of air was what swam _under_ me.

My focus at Hell’s Gate had been botany, sure, but that didn’t mean I was totally ignorant of Pandoran fauna. The creature I was staring at now had only been captured once on camera, and one look at the blurry image had made me extremely grateful to work in a field that wouldn’t require me to meet it in person.

The sagittaria under me swam lazily and without any intent to attack but that didn’t stop my heart from practically stopping. The cephalopod-like creature was easily fifteen feet in length, the spines of its brightly colored shell coming dangerously close as it meandered below. As I began to swim forward, not wanting to waste even more air staring at the fourteen tentacles and wicked-looking beak, the creature followed and I very nearly screamed again when it did.

The lights were an effective deterrent—when the tentacles inched up as if to grab me, they flinched back as if burnt when reaching the floating orbs.

The path continued for quite a while and I quickened my pace when the lights began to arch upwards toward what I prayed was a connecting pool in a different cave.

Gritting my teeth, I swam even harder, ignoring the burning of my lungs and focusing on the shimmering circle of water above me—I was so _close_!

I kicked outwards and felt something pop under my foot, something strangely soft. My head broke the surface before I could think about it and I took a gasping gulp of air. Kinak was sitting by the pool along with Ninoa; both of them looked over at my loud arrival. All I got was one brief moment of relief, one large breath, before a tentacle wrapped around my ankle and yanked me back down.

Before I could go fully under, I felt two pairs of hands grab under my armpits and attempt to pull me back up. Water rushed into my mouth as I let out a panicked yell at the pain of being pulled in two directions. My noise and mouth were just under the pool’s surface and the steady pressure of being downwards made it impossible for me to tilt my head back and get air.

“Sara—” I heard someone yell in a brief moment where my head was allowed far enough up for me to take a gasping breath. But then the tentacle yanked, _hard,_ and I yelped in pain at the strain it put my knee. Instinct demanded I reach for my knife at my side but Kinak and Ninoa’s grip prevented me from doing so.

“Knife!” I screamed when my mouth cleared the water. Ninoa’s eyes widened and she released my shoulder long enough to shove a knife into my newly freed hand. Ducking my head under water, I stabbed at the bright blue tentacle, ignoring the line of pain that erupted when I scratched myself on the calf in my haste. Through the bubbles of agitated water I saw how the creature had approached—my uncoordinated kick had ruptured the light orb closest to the pool’s entrance.

Black-green blood spurted from where I made contact and immediately the sagittaria withdrew into the depths of the water. Kinak and Ninoa pulled me up and out of the pool so forcefully that I was practically lying on top of them but I didn’t care—didn’t care about anything besides the fact that I was out of the water.

“Fuck, fuck, _fuck_,” I gasped in English as I pressed my forehead against the wet stone, hissing at the pain in my knee and calf. Ninoa withdrew the moment I was safely out of the pool but Kinak’s grip remained secure around my waist. If I hadn’t been so focused on taking deep breaths, I probably would have been focusing much more on the fact that his arm was trembling slightly.

My eyes snapped open when I felt unexpected fingers touching my leg and my entire body flinched away from the contact. Sana’s gentle golden eyes stared back at me, her forehead creasing with worry.

“Breathe, _tìfti_,” the younger Na’vi woman gently urged. The use of the nickname she and Teril had given me helped ease the panic still skittering across my skin.

“I’m fine,” I grunted, attempting to get to my feet. Before I could, I felt a hand firmly push down on my shoulder. To my surprise, it was Ninoa, her gaze steely.

“Don’t be stupid; you need to rest.”

Frowning, I looked up at the rest of the group. “But the Txampfya—”

Akwei moved to stand beside Ninoa. “You think we would leave you behind?” he asked, and I felt my cheeks heat up at the accusation veiled within the question. Kinak’s shoulder brushed against mine as he joined Sana in examining my calf.

“Just needs some ointment,” he murmured and reached into his belt to pull out a small wooden jar that smelled strongly of herbs.

Sana blinked. “_You_ brought healing supplies?” she asked, surprise clear in her voice. Kinak’s ears flicked backwards in a moment of embarrassment, almost too quick to catch. Teril letting out a harsh sigh distracted us; she was peering over the edge of the pool, eyes narrowing as she watched the creature’s blood dispel.

“Citra should have warned us,” she seethed. I frowned at her tone, sitting up once Kinak had finished.

“No, it was my own fault—I accidentally kicked one of the lights,” I countered. Kinak let out a huff that sounded suspiciously like a laugh but when I looked over his expression was as indecipherable as ever. Teril wasn’t nearly as subtle in her response; her ears pinned and she bared her teeth in clear frustration.

“If we had known of the _skuka _beforehand, one of us would have accompanied you,” she reasoned. “You are still new to your Na’vi body and Citra_ knows_ this—what if Kinak and Ninoa hadn’t been able to grab you in time?”

My own ears flicked backwards. “I’m not weak,” I spat, rolling over to push myself up into a kneeling position. It put strain on my knee but the pain was bearable and so I pushed it aside.

Surprising me once again, Ninoa crouched down to meet my eye. “No, you’re not, but letting us mark you makes you one of us—and Tipani keep their brothers and sisters safe. Would you object to your _human_ kin taking care of you?”

The words made me remember the picture in my pocket. An icy weight settling in my chest, I frantically felt for the picture inside the damp leather pouch. The moment I touched the sturdy plastic surface the weight dissipated and I could breathe again.

“What is that?” Sana asked when I pulled the photo out to better examine it. Her voice made me jump; I had been so focused on my task that I hadn’t realized that all of them had gathered around to better see what I held—Kinak and Sana on either side of me while Akwei and Teril crouched down to join Ninoa.

Instead of answering with words I simply held out the picture.

Five pairs of large golden eyes zeroed in on the plastic square and for a full minute the only sound that filled the space was the wet sound of water against the sides of the pool. It was in that time that I glanced around to better gauge my surroundings. The cave we sat in was larger than the last one, walls brightly lit with green and pink moss, and if I craned my neck I could see the faint glimmer of daylight from around one of the larger boulders—no doubt the entrance to the banshee nest.

“You have her smile,” Akwei said suddenly, one finger tracing the face of my mother. “Are these…?”

Swallowing past the lump in my throat, I nodded. “Those were my parents. This is called a ‘photograph’—” I explained, saying the new (for them, anyway) word in English. “—and it was taken the day I left for Pandora…oh wow, almost fourteen years ago,” I finished, blinking past the tears and focusing on Mom’s face.

“I didn’t think humans looked so much like us when they smile,” Ninoa said quietly, her brow furrowed as she stared down at the picture. When she noticed everyone staring at her she hurried to stand up and take a few steps away from the group, scowling.

Teril ignored her and peered closer at the laminated photo. “Were you considered attractive as a human? I don’t mean to offend you,” she hurried to add on when I let out a surprised laugh. “It’s just that I’ve never seen one.”

“Me neither,” added Sana. When I looked to Akwei he shook his head to signify that he was in the same boat.

Sighing, I shrugged. “I wasn’t _ugly_, I suppose, but—” I began, but Kinak’s curt voice interrupted with:

“Her human hair was beautiful—long and golden, like sunlight.”

My cheeks flared with heat at the matter-of-fact tone. I couldn’t quite find it in me to meet his gaze, even when Sana, Teril and Akwei moved to join Ninoa at the banshee next entrance, too focused on controlling the tickling feeling that had erupted in my chest. I had almost forgotten that Sänume, Kinak and Lielu had been present at my transfer ceremony and in a moment of horrifying clarity I realized that that meant all three of them had seen me undressed—in both human_ and_ Avatar form.

Suddenly, all I wanted was for the sagittaria to make a reappearance and try to drag me underwater again—maybe that would distract my mind enough to let me forget that _Kinak, _of all people, had seen me _naked_. I’m no prude, not by a long shot, but something about the Na’vi man next to me seeing my small, comparatively ugly naked human body sent a confusing wave of shame up and down my spine.

Maybe I should have paid more attention to those whispered comments when I first arrived at Hometree—the observations about how my Avatar body was ugly perhaps weren’t as cruelly meant as I had assumed at the time. If they didn’t think much of human features, it would make sense that a blend of Na’vi and human wouldn’t be considered attractive among the People.

After placing the picture back in my pocket I hurried to stand as well, wincing slightly at the tenderness of my knee but able to walk fine enough.

“Sara,” Kinak said quietly, his hand reaching out as if to steady me but withdrawing at the last second.

I shook my head at him. “I have to do this,” I said firmly. His jaw clenched in clear disagreement but he didn’t say anything more—just let out a huffing breath before moving to join the others. I watched him go, watched the tense line of his shoulders straighten as he reached the nest entrance.

The sight made me forget the pain in my knee for a moment because this was Kinak’s _dream_. If asked why he was doing the Txampfya, he would most likely say that he was eager to join the warrior ranks in order to bring honor to the Clan or something, but a stubborn part of me knew that it was much more personal. In the way I had once craved an unshakable bond with another creature—later fulfilled by making _tsaheylu_ with Tanhì—Kinak craved _flight_. Not just the bond, no, I could see much more than that in the way Kinak stared up at the sky long after the riders disappeared from sight.

A small smile tugged at my mouth at the sight of Kinak’s tail twitching as he peered around the side of the boulder, his entire body energized in a way rarely seen because he was usually so careful in how he presented himself to others.

_Are you ready? _I asked myself as I walked forward, intensely aware of every step as I did so. The strong smell of banshee dung flowed into the cave along with the loud, shrill screeches from the animals in question. The scent wasn’t exactly pleasant; it set my nerves on edge with an odd mixture of discomfort and excitement.

This time, there was no silent asking who would go first—all eyes immediately went to me. The unspoken decision made my chest tighten with emotion. Banshee or no banshee, all six of us had exchanged marks and and walked into the unknown together and that wasn’t something easily pushed aside. Swallowing back the lump in my throat, I looked to Kinak, wondering what he gleaned from my expression in that moment.

After a long moment, he nodded in the direction of the entrance.

_Go on,_ the gesture said.

And so I did.


	13. Fight and Flight

The sunlight was so intense that it took several hurried blinks for my eyes to adjust. When they did, I gaped at the huge expanse of rock that housed hundreds of colorful banshees. The creatures were never silent—even when calmly sitting on their perches they released continuous trills of sound that quickly morphed into ear-splitting shrieks. Cool ocean air rushed up over the cliff edges, the clean salt smell only discernable for a brief moment before being overrun by the stench of banshee excrement. Lielu had explained that the breeding nests were entirely separate from the cliffs that warrior hopefuls visited—the former housed the female banshees, slightly larger than their male counterparts and more than slightly vicious. Females, along with the hatchlings too young to survive on their own, inhabited the higher cliffs.

I was so focused on the banshees that I didn’t notice Citra sitting on the ground just beside the cave entrance, jumping slightly when she rose and moved to stand beside me. Kinak and the others moved to stand on my other side; I could feel their excitement, so palpable that I began to fidget in an attempt to contain my own.

Citra’s hand reached over to grasp my forearm, warm and steady, and I turned to meet her solemn gaze.

“When you feel the shift in energy, move quick and move _smart_. Do you understand?” she hissed in English, her ears pinning when I didn’t respond right away.

I quickly nodded. My skin prickled at the urgency in her tone and for a moment I wondered if turning back was still an option. I swallowed back the urge to ask and unwrapped the_ meresh'ti cau'pla_ from around my belt. The inner layer was still sticky when I pressed an experimental finger to the surface. The idea that such a seemingly fragile plant stem could contain the jaws of a banshee was insane to say the least but it wasn’t like I had any other way to subdue the creature without causing serious damage. 

Wind blustered against me when I left the shielded area just outside the cave. Heartbeat hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribcage, I made my way along a crest of rocks that overlooked the clusters of the banshees. Unsurprisingly, a few of the smaller ones saw me coming and screeched before spreading their wings and diving away. My sweaty palm slipped slightly against the handle of the _meresh'ti cau'pla _and I shook my head firmly to clear it of any anxiety.

Jake had described the banshee-selection process as instinctual—the moment he had locked eyes with Rogue, his entire body experienced a wave of recognition that was so clearly _not_ human that even his less than scientifically experienced mind been able to recognize it as such. Would it be the same feeling for me? Or would it be a deliberate choice to initiate _tsaheylu_ on my part, as it had been with Tanhì? Jake was all heart; I wasn’t nearly as emotionally driven and so I wondered if the process would be just as different.

Sucking in a breath to bolster myself, I tossed caution to the wind and jumped down into the nest with a flourish, almost in the center of one of the larger groups. Proud cries erupted behind me—Sana and Akwei, it sounded like—only to be silenced just as quickly. Although I appreciated the sentiment behind the cheering I was just as grateful to whoever had put an end to it.

I needed to focus, after all.

The moment I had landed, three of the seven banshees immediately took off, nearly bowling over each other in their haste. I was beginning to notice the differences in the ways the banshees retreated—older, larger males made eye contact before running away while the younger ones didn’t even bother with the formality. As I straightened from my crouch, frowning as the rest of the group hurried away, I wondered if the banshees somehow knew that meeting our eyes is what initiated the potential release of whatever chemicals were involved in the selection process. Maybe that was why the younger ones were so careful not to make eye contact—maybe on some level they _knew_ that they weren’t old enough to make that sort of bond. I’d have to send a message to Max and see what he thought of it—he was the brain expert, after all.

As the minutes ticked by I grew more and more frustrated. No matter how aggressively or hesitantly I approached, every single banshee I encountered couldn’t get away fast enough. My tail whipped behind me in irritation when yet another male—he was a brilliant green color, so pretty that part of me had really hoped for a connection just to be able to admire it up close—dove over the cliff’s edge. I twisted to look around, wondering what the hell was _wrong_, when something caught my eye.

Caught in one of my braids was a broken off piece of one of Tanhì’s spine sheaths. She had been shedding the outer layers of the spines as she grew and was almost done shedding all together, save for a few stubborn patches clinging to the fully grown spines.

My scent so closely intertwined with the thanator’s would only say one thing to a fellow predator—I was _dangerous_, more dangerous than I looked. Wait, was there a way for other intelligent creatures of Pandora to sense the presence of a _tsaheylu_ already established? No wonder the banshees weren’t engaging!

I let out a frustrated hiss and whipped around to face Citra and the rest, holding up the piece of sheath.

“They smell Tanhì on me, they won’t…” I began, trailing off and frowning at the sudden look of horror that crossed the faces of the warrior-hopefuls as they all looked up at something above me.

A terrible screech split the air—so close that the sound vibrated all the way down to my bones—and it was only hours of stealth drills with Citra that allowed me to drop to the ground as quickly as I did. Even with that, I still felt the kiss of claws against my shoulder, barely enough to break the skin but enough to leave three thin lines of red against my skin. A huge shadow passed overhead and the rocks noisily clattered together as the source landed. I scrambled to my feet, gasping heavy gulps of air into my lungs.

The banshee before me was large, larger than any of the ones I had seen so far, marking her as decidedly female from moment one. Her coloring was much more muted than the males; a solid color instead of patterned, the exact same green as the surrounding trees.

Our eyes met—hers were huge and gold—and something _clicked_. A mental pressure eased in my brain, a pressure I hadn’t even been aware of until it was lifted. I saw the same release of tension in the banshee across from me; her wings folded almost _primly_ even as her lips peeled back to show her teeth, a clear sign that she wasn’t about to run away any time soon.

“_There _you are,” I cooed, my voice unconsciously raising to carry the words across the space—as if the banshee could _understand. _Her large green head waved back and forth, waiting to strike, and instead of fear I felt only excitement. Her body language expressed a predatory playfulness that I recognized from many hours spent mock-fighting with Tanhì.

The banshee knew I was her rider even though the bond wasn’t complete; she just wanted to test me a bit to see if I could keep up.

As if sensing my thoughts, the banshee lunged. The weeks spent running through practice trials with the weapon gave me the muscle memory to step aside at the last second, jerking my hand up and wrapping the _meresh'ti cau'pla _around the female banshee’s snout and effectively muzzling her. Her folded wing came up almost immediately, clipping me on the back of the head and sending me careening sideways into a boulder. Spitting out some blood from where my mouth collided with the stone, I let out a hiss and ran towards my banshee, ducking under her wing when she tried the same trick as before and jumping onto her back. The _meresh'ti cau'pla _handle swung under her jaw and I grabbed it with both hands just as she was about to try and fling her head back. I yanked down with all my strength while flattening myself against her neck just in case my strength wasn’t enough.

It was, thank God. Letting out a muffled scream upon being thwarted, the banshee resisted, making me grunt with the effort of keeping her contained. I saw several droplets of my blood on her neck when I lifted my head to find the queue sheath closest to me.

The only way I was going to be able to connect our neural strands was if I let go of the handle. If I did it when her head was already down on its own it would take her a moment to notice that my hands were gone. It was a stupid, _reckless_ idea but it was all I could come up with.

Sucking in a deep breath, I yanked down even harder on the _meresh'ti cau'pla_, praying that the creature would take the bait. After a few more seconds spent resisting she lowered her head to try and knock my hands away. The moment I felt the pressure lift I let go, grabbing my braid with one hand and her queue with the other.

Her body twisted sharply just as I made_ tsaheylu, _sending me sliding down over her shoulder and onto my feet. My arms around her neck were the only thing that kept me from falling over and breaking the connection. I was glad to have the banshee's shoulder to lean against because her mind surged into mine like an adrenaline shot.

Thanks to my bond with Tanhì, the intense connection didn’t cripple me like it probably would have if I had only practiced bonding with direhorses. The banshee’s mind contained a cool sharpness that was utterly foreign and jarring.

_Reptilian_, my human vocabulary supplied.

The banshee let out a soft trill, nuzzling at my braids and hissing at the scent of thanator. Accustomed to doing so with Tanhì, I automatically reached across the bond and soothed the instinctual wariness, assuring her that the specific scent she was picking up on wasn't a threat. She remained unconvinced; a decidedly suspicious snort escaped her flared nostrils.

Once I was sure that our minds were properly separated, I opened my eyes, blinking slowly to adjust to the heightened vision that came along with the bond. The banshee crooned at me as I moved to mount, aware of my earlier struggle with the sagittaria and bending her neck to accommodate my aching knee as a result. Smiling, I traced my fingers along her jaw and briefly scratched underneath her chin in thanks.

“Time to go,” I murmured, swinging up and gingerly adjusting my legs until I was in a comfortable position on her back. Loud voices suddenly reached me and I jumped in surprise at the intrusion.

Sana, Teril and Akwei were shamelessly cheering and calling out encouraging sentiments. Citra was shaking her head in disbelief but wasn’t wearing her usual scowl so I decided not to worry about it. Ninoa looked visibly impressed, which was more than I had ever expected from her. I saved Kinak for last and felt warmth in my cheeks at the proud smile he gave me.

“I’ll catch up to you,” he called out, unrolling his _meresh'ti cau'pla _as he stepped forward. I couldn’t help but grin at the bold declaration.

“You’ll _try_!” I tossed back, facing forward and urged my banshee into flight without waiting for his response, gripping the uppermost part of her queue sheaths as she gracefully dove off of the cliffs. Her mind mixed with mine just enough that I didn’t scream at how high up we were but I was still myself enough to be surprised at the way my stomach lurched from the drop.

The wind tore at my hair as we fell, creating a roar so loud that it blocked out even the rapid beating of my heart. My feet slipped a bit from their place on the jutting bones above her air holes, less dexterous than a born-Na’vi’s would be and therefore unable to grip quite as tightly. Sensing the lack of security, the creature changed the angle of the fall ever so slightly to compensate, the powerful muscles so close to my awareness that it almost felt like _my_ body was moving as well. I silently thanked her for the adjustment and sent a burst of affection across the bond in the same way I always did with Tanhì, blinking in surprise when the banshee flinched away from the sentiment.

As she snapped open her wings to even out our descent, I realized what the issue was. The banshee wasn’t my baby, wasn’t my Tanhì, and yet I had sent her the same motherly approval. The winged creature I rode wasn’t to be coddled like my thanator or firmly directed like a direhorse. She was a partner—her trust would have to be _earned_.

The banshee's mind was fully developed, giving me glimpses of memories and sensations from the span of her life. From the snippets I received when we first joined minds, I knew she had lived through three rainy seasons—in her mind it was shown as just long periods of rain that I had to count for myself—and that she wouldn’t be ready to mate for at least two more rainy seasons.

Her name came to me as we glided along the tops of the nearby canopies; her hide blended seamlessly with the sunlit leaves.

“Rìka,” I murmured under my breath, leaning forward to place a hand on the female’s strong neck. ‘Rìk’ was Na’vi for ‘leaf’, with a little English flair in there by adding an ‘a’ to make the name more feminine sounding. The banshee shivered under my touch, the bond solidifying more and more with every beat of her powerful wings. 

Shifting my weight to adjust to the turns and dives was awkward at first but I knew that within a few weeks it would become as natural as breathing. Rìka’s mind seeped into mine like the roots of a tree, lending me her senses as well as her knowledge of the area. She noted all of the best hunting spots as we went and they imbedded themselves into my mind as easily as seeds in freshly plowed earth. The air tasted different depending on the species and age of the flora we passed and the subtlety of the banshee’s sense of smell astounded me.

A piercing screech behind us made Rìka bank sharply left, instinct demanding she face the threat head on before deciding whether or not to flee. I turned my head to look for Kinak, ready to tease him for taking so long, but my entire body froze at the sight of someone with uniquely broad shoulders approaching on a familiar blue banshee.

“_Jake_,” I breathed. Rìka’s wings fluttered uncertainly, unsure of whether the figure approaching was friend or foe based on my sudden surge of emotion. As Jake flew closer I was quick to declare that the banshee and rider were indeed friends and took several deep breaths to steady myself.

It was just _Jake_—why was I so jumpy all of a sudden?

For once, Jake didn’t smile when he reached me. Instead his face was solemn, his eyes a bit wild as Rogue circled us. Rìka hissed when the other banshee tried to scent her along her wing and the male banshee dipped farther away in clear deference to the female’s warning.

Jake met my gaze and tilted his head towards a rocky ledge jutting out from the nearby ridge. Without waiting for confirmation, he and Rogue dove to the right and headed for the ledge. Rìka wanted to fly away and find the others that were surely not too far behind me but I sharpened my mind and commanded her to follow Jake to the impromptu meeting place. 

I landed clumsily, ears flicking backwards at Rìka’s disgruntled shriek at the lack of coordination on my part. Scratching at her itchy places helped to soothe the irritation; I smiled when the banshee finally relented and rubbed her cheek against my shoulder—marking me with her scent.

“Sara,” Jake said. The way his voice shaped my name sent a shiver down my spine because it sounded like _home_. The American accent brought me back to my human self, if only for a moment, back to the feeling of Jake’s human hand brushing my blonde hair away from my face when I would get too engrossed in my latest lab report and forget to respond to a question—

I turned to face him, ready to demand what his problem was, and suddenly he was _right there—_tall and handsome and _pissed_. The words died in my throat even as my body instinctively stood its ground; accustomed to keeping my head high among the Tipani even when my mind screamed at me to run and hide.

“Jake,” I replied neutrally. My tail whipped behind my ankles, betraying the irritation I had managed to keep out of my tone. My friend’s golden eyes snapped to the appendage for a moment, catching the small gesture in a way that betrayed how many years he had spent as a soldier.

_Dr. Augustine didn’t bat an eyelash when I stormed into the lab the morning after Jake informed us of the Omaticaya Clan’s decision to teach him Na’vi ways, keeping her eyes on the computer screen as she inputted numbers from yesterday’s data collection. _

_I scowled as I sat down across from her, taking an aggressive sip of my coffee and spluttering when it burned my tongue. My mentor’s chuckle caught my attention and my lips turned down in suspicion. _

_“What?” I asked shortly, the pain in my mouth sharpening my tone. _

_Dr. Augustine raised an eyebrow at me before returning her gaze to the screen. “How is he this morning?” _

_I blinked. “Who?” _

_“Jake.” _

_My brow furrowed in renewed irritation at the mention of his name. “Why do you think I saw Jake this morning?” _

_“Sara,” she replied, her voice casual but with a hint of steel behind it. My shoulders hunched in defeat at the implied scolding, somehow so clear even in just one word. I let out a petulant groan and pushed my coffee aside so I could lean my forehead on the cool white table. _

_“I went over to the link room and offered him my journal on Na’vi culture, the one that includes your notes on Omaticaya-specific customs, and he _laughed_,” I seethed, sitting up and running my hands through my not yet braided hair. “He flipped through it, gave me this look that just _screamed_ ‘you’re insane’ and handed it back to me! As if it wouldn’t save him _weeks _of trial and error!” _

_Dr. Augustine sent me a knowing look. “And then you walked away without saying another word and accepted his poor decision-making, right?” she asked, sarcasm bleeding through every word. _

_“_Someone_ had to tell him how irresponsible he was acting,” I muttered, cheeks burning. I slumped farther down into my chair. The more I thought about it, the sillier I felt—why could I never just walk _away_ from him?_

_That pulled an honest laugh out of Dr. Augustine. “I’ll have to ask Max to send me that part of the security footage,” she mused. Ignoring my annoyed glare, she moved her chair so she was fading me head-on without a computer in the way, her expression turning serious._

_“Jake Sully is reckless, yes, but he’s_ smart_. None of us could have done what he did in Hometree—can you tell me why?” _

_I frowned. “He said it himself; they were interested in him being a solider and that’s why they let him stay.”_

_Dr. Augustine shook her head. “They don’t give a shit about him being a soldier—that was just a front. They took him in because Neytiri saw something in him that made her willing to break her father’s command against allowing Skypeople in Hometree. They took him in because Jake was able to adapt even under intense pressure. Long story short?” the woman asked, a small smirk crossing her lips as she continued: _

_“Jake is smart with_ people_, and that requires more observation skills than you’d think.” _

Jake’s voice brought me out of the memory:

“Are you fucking _kidding_ me, Sara? Playing mother to a thanator, making the _bond_ with it, letting the person who tried to _kill _you go to another Clan as if nothing even happened?” he snapped, taking a step closer until we were almost chest-to-chest. I flinched back at the harsh words but kept my head high.

“Last I checked—” I hissed back through gritted teeth. “—I was my own person, Jake. So stop it with the macho, Toruk Makto bullshit and talk_ to_ me instead of _at_ me!”

Jake’s eyes flashed and for a moment I felt the strangest urge to bare my teeth at him, to keep pressing until he had no choice but to push me against the nearest surface and—

I blinked, my entire body freezing at the unexpected suggestion the most primal part of my brain had provided. What the hell was _that_?

My friend bared his own teeth, ignorant of my inner turmoil, and then his gaze flicked down to my neck. I reached up to touch, confused, and realized he was staring at the mark left by Winan’s knife. I had chosen not to wear the bandage today considering that the wound was mostly scabbed over.

Jake’s shoulders slumped. In an instant he became the human man in the wheelchair again, staring out at the forests of Pandora as he told me about his brother. He moved as if to touch my neck but hesitated, making it clear he was remembering the last time we touched. I wondered if the sensation had lingered with him as it had with me; never quite at the forefront of our thoughts until we stood face to face.

Swallowing hard past the sudden lump in my throat, I reached for his hand and gently tugged it forward so that he was touching the mostly healed cut. The spark of heat appeared, just as it had before, but unlike last time it seemed to dance along my entire _arm_. 

“Hey—” I began, my voice cracking as I prepared to ask him if he felt the same thing I did when we touched, to ask him what it _was_.

“You could have _died_, Sara,” he whispered. His hand moved to cup the back of my neck, the five fingers of his hand calloused and strong against my skin.

I sucked in a sharp breath. “I know,” I whispered back. It was all I could say—he knew as well as I did how dangerous Pandora was and how naïve it would be to make promises to stay safe. Those were promises _neither_ of us could keep.

The silence continued until a series of banshee screeches and shouts in Na’vi above us suddenly sounded. Jake took a hurried step back and the moment broke cleanly in two. The heat disappeared from my skin but didn’t leave a void in its wake—I felt almost _sated_, not that it made any sense to label it as such because there was no reason to crave Jake’s presence the way I did.

I looked up to see my Txampfya companions flying together and my spirits soared at the sight of Kinak on his blue-green banshee. A huge smile spread across my face and without thinking I lifted my hand and released a sharp cry of triumph. He responded in kind almost immediately, his grin visible even from a distance.

I looked over at Jake to find him still staring at me.

“Fly with us?” I asked, extending the figurative olive branch.

Jake’s eyes lit up for a split second—he _wanted_ to say yes—but then he gave me a weak smile and shook his head. “Maybe next time, Mason. I’ll meet you back at Tipani Hometree.”

I frowned, trying to ignore the painful sting his rejection caused. “Jake, I—”

Jake stopped my question with a firm shake of his head. “Go on; they’re waiting for you,” he reminded me, jerking his chin upward to where Citra and the others were circling. I heard the faint but still discernable calls from them and my heart ached from being torn in two very different directions.

Chest tight, I turned away from Jake and walked to my banshee, smiling at the way the creature’s head perked up at my approach.

After making the bond I swung myself onto Rìka’s back and together we dove off of the ledge, quickly extending our wings to prevent us from going too far downwards. I didn’t look back as we joined the group, not even when I heard Rogue take flight behind me.

The fact that the sound faded almost immediately was a cruel reminder that Jake was choosing to fly alone. 


End file.
